All Hands on Deck

February 6, 2023
“I always knew sailing Rose to California was a special, once in a lifetime kind of experience. But it took me two decades to truly understand what I got out of it,” recollects shipwright Sofrin in this nostalgic account of sailing a replica of an 18th-century British warship from Rhode Island to California in 2002. Hired as a deck hand, 21-year-old Sofrin and his fellow crew members piloted the Rose down the Atlantic seaboard, through the Panama Canal, and up the Pacific coast to San Diego, where it would be used in the film Master and Commander: The Far Side of the World. From patching a leaky hull and climbing 10 stories up to secure a broken section of the mainmast, the 30-person crew had to learn the “forgotten skills” of sailing an 18th-century “tall ship” on the fly. Sofrin intersperses details of life aboard the Rose with tidbits of tall ship history and enlightening commentary on Patrick O’Brian’s Aubrey-Maturin novels, on which the film was based. High-spirited and finely detailed, this adventure tale will delight sailors of all stripes. Photos. Agent: Max Sinsheimer, Sinsheimer Literary.

March 1, 2023
A memoir of the voyage of a replica warship from Rhode Island to California. In his debut book, Sofrin recounts his 2002 journey from Newport, Rhode Island, to San Diego, California, aboard a replica of an 18th-century English Royal Navy frigate named Rose. The ship had been purchased by Twentieth Century Fox to be used in the making of the film Master and Commander: The Far Side of the World, based on the Aubrey-Maturin series of novels by Patrick O'Brian. At the time, Sofrin was 21, with few job prospects, but he had recently spent time sailing a boat in Europe. With some hesitation, he accepted the position in Newport, working to help prepare the ship to make the trip. Later, he was asked to join the crew as a deckhand and carpenter for the passage as well as to stay on to assist with the movie. "I had assumed that I'd be spending most of a single day on Rose, doing a bunch of dirty work that nobody else wanted to do," writes the author. "Instead, I had just been offered a paid crew position to sail from Newport to California to make a movie." Sofrin vividly describes the motley crew and diligently chronicles their charted course through the Panama Canal and on to various locations in Mexico before docking in San Diego. They departed Newport in January and soon began encountering problems, including electrical fires, water leaks, massive waves, and gale force winds, which had them fearing they would have to abandon ship. Forced to reevaluate "how to handle adversity," Sofrin realized that "the only way out was through." With an enthralling style, Sofrin recounts these events as well as the personality dynamics that developed aboard the ship. Throughout, the author also discusses historic and modern aspects of sailing and accompanies his narrative with technical drawings and photographs. Experienced sailors and landlubbers alike will find Sofrin's work a pleasure to read.

COPYRIGHT(2023) Kirkus Reviews, ALL RIGHTS RESERVED.

April 15, 2023
Sailing a three-masted ship from Newport, Rhode Island, to San Diego should be a routine affair, but life on the seas is ever unpredictable. Here, the boat in question is the Rose, a carefully crafted reproduction of an eighteenth-century British frigate. Outfitted with enough conveniences to render it safe and seaworthy, the ship was requisitioned by a Hollywood studio and destined to become a crucial part of the set for the 2003 film Master and Commander: The Far Side of the World, starring Russell Crowe. Author Sofrin brought to the 30-person crew his enthusiasm and some knowledge of boatbuilding. The voyage toward the Panama Canal seemed routine. Then a dreaded rogue wave hit the Rose, and part of a mast snapped, crippling the vessel and delaying its arrival for film production. Sofrin spares little detail, making all the issues of sailing and shipbuilding much less intimidating through carefully rendered diagrams, with all parts of the ship's superstructure and complex rigging meticulously labeled. Fans of the movie and serious sailors will revel in Sofrin's tale.

COPYRIGHT(2023) Booklist, ALL RIGHTS RESERVED.