Customer comments on this Youngstown Ohio Book
 Or how to BUILD a Cruising Sailboat?
I eagerly added this book to my wish list based on it's title and found that what was inside the book was less about selecting your ideal cruising sailboat than it was about selecting a custom design, or perhaps directing the construction of your custom dream boat.
Those who have owned sailboats in the past would be less likely to choose this book than people like me, just getting started and looking for some informed help. Unfortunately, those needing this help most - people with the least experience - will be the ones least helped by it.
What was missing from this book (in my humble opinion) is a review of existing cruising sailboats, blurbs written by people who own and sail them, pros and cons about their design, sailing characteristics, and recommended modifications to make them fit various sailor's needs.
In all fairmess, I did learn about hull shapes and the like, but there was no "joining" of hull design factors to existing boats that possess these designs, making all the technical information in the book rather useless.
I'm sure many very experienced sailors will find this book fascinating and perhaps even incorporate some of the author's ideas into designs for their custom boats. Unfortunately, for the sailor looking to choose a cruising sailboat, this book falls short and is a dissapointment.
 A good book about sailboat design
I was looking for a book that would help me select a cruising sailboat, as the title suggested. This is really a book about sailboat design and design features that must be considered for different types of cruising. The book was very interesting in terms of boat design, as it lays out the "design thinking" and use-specific features in the design of five different boat types. Because we already know exactly what sort of cruising we intend to do, this book didn't get us very much further down the "choosing a boat" path. It is, however, useful in terms of helping evaluate used boats and their design features based on the important features of his "model" designs. This book will educate, but won't necessarily help you choose from the wide range of used boats that are out there. The Used Boat Guide "from the pages of Sailing Magazine" is an excellent choice if that's the sort of help you're looking for. I give it three stars only because the title is a bit misleading - a better title might be "Choosing the Right Cruising Sailboat DESIGN".
Choosing a Cruising Sailboat???
My review is simply that this book was mis-titled. It should have read Designing a Cruising Sailboat not Choosing. It speaks less of real boats and more about 4-5 mythical boats of which the author walks you through the design process of. If you've got lots of cash and want to see your custom design come to life this book may be for you. The author even goes so far as to say that proper boat maintenance starts when you visit your boat builder while your boat is being built and blah blah...at this point I considered the book a loss.
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