Three years in a 12-foot boat

For anyone who dreams of sailing away, here is a gritty memoir of a 15,000-mile solo expedition in a tiny rowboat.

Ladd ranges from the upper Missouri to the pirate-ridden coast of Colombia, across the Andes, down a 600-mile river by night to avoid guerrillas, and back via the Caribbean.

Robbed, capsized, arrested and befriended, he navigates a tumult of uncharted adventures.

The true-life characters: Dieter, mad ex-Nazi on a desert island; Hans, the smuggler who disappears at sea; castaways, prostitutes, and fortune seekers.

Stow away with a poetic storyteller on a stormy voyage through nineteen countries.