Book Reviews: Gear List of the Golden Moon, and The Book of Leadership

Have you ever thought about rowing up the coast in an open boat for, I dunno, a month?

Yeah, me neither.

But on vacation, I saw this book, and I just had to open it up:

I had to know if the author, Dick Callahan, was trolling me. He was not. He describes his journey up the coast from Seattle to Alaska in yes, an open boat. Watch the book’s trailer to see some of the book’s pictures.

He gives specific advice about inlets and passages like the Taku River, where for three days a year, the river volume is over 100,000 cubic feet per second. He talks about how you have to watch out for katabatic winds produced by large glaciers and ice sheets. He discusses preparation, exercise, and how to avoid blisters.

He explains why you need a Black Deck Bucket:

“When you’re halfway through a ten mile open crossing, and your bowels begin shouting that it’s time to take the hobbits to Isengard, you don’t want your elegant, white canvas deck bucket all pimped out with macramé and a marlinspike lanyard. That will never be the same if you use it to take a dump.”

Alrighty then.

I have no intention of ever owning, let alone rowing, an open boat. But Gear List of the Golden Moon made for excellent reading while I lounged on a cruise ship, waiters bringing me one margarita after another. (No, the book isn’t available on Kindle.)

The Book of Leadership by Anthony Gell

Management books are such a dice roll, but Jen Stirrup recommended this, and I’m glad she did. Some business books try to take a small concept and expand it into a profit-making book. This book takes the opposite approach – it covers a lot of ground from a lot of different topics, fast. The best way to review this book is to note how many pages I folded over in order to revisit later:

Two thumbs up, and a lot of pages folded down. If you manage a team or want to build a business, grab it at Amazon.