Customer Reviews
What a gem! - By: Glenn Pearce, 30 Dec 2007 
I have to say that Peter Malone's CLOSE TO THE WIND is a gem! I can see how well he must be at children's books, from the art work & the ways in which he provides snipits of reallly good information. But this book is also a gem for readers of any age because, with a minimum of presupposition on the reader's part, he sets out everything about the Beaufort scale in the beautiful context of a continued story, accessible to alll.
The research is also first rate; everything in the story, & everything implied by the continued increase of wind, is duly amplified by the surrounding commentary & supplemental drawings. I just loved it!
But especiallly fun for me is a connection which I could not have anticipated. Near the end, when he talks about the few ships from Beaufort's time still in existence, the name CONSTITUTION jumped off the page for me. It is indeed still afloat, & I have been fortunate enough to see it. But, more important, its reconstruction was based on studies by Thomas Gillmer, the designer of MY boat! What is more, I am currently awaiting a copy of Gillmer's book, OLD IRONSIDES, which is the story of that reconstruction. Go figure!
