Completely Mad
Tom McClean, John Fairfax, and the Epic of the Race to Row Solo Across the Atlantic
Published on 4. July 2023
352 pages
978-1-63936-418-3 (ISBN)
Description
From the New York Times bestselling author of The First Man comes a sweeping saga involving two extraordinary-and extraordinarily different-adventurers who have only one thing in common: the ambition to cross the Atlantic in a rowboat . . . alone.
In this bracing adventure tale, the stories of John Fairfax and Tom McLean are woven together for the first time. Fairfax would set off from the Canary Islands off the coast of Africa with his sights on Florida. McClean charted a course from Newfoundland to Ireland.
The two men couldn't have been more different. John Fairfax was a golden-haired playboy, gambler, whiskey, gun smuggler, and ex-pirate who blamed his boat often, and who brazenly took time off from his goal of reaching America to hop aboard large ships for a drink, a shower, and good food. He courted the press like a modern-day Richard Branson or Elon Musk.
The egoless Tom McClean was an orphan with a tough, Dickensian childhood, who ran off to become a British paratrooper and later joined the SAS (his training rivaled the U.S. Navy Seals). Tom was a purist who loved his boat Silver and never once took time off from rowing to sun himself on a remote beach or jump aboard a cruise ship. After 70 days, he landed on the rocky coast of Ireland to no fanfare and headed straight to the nearest pub.
Though the two men's remarkable transoceanic journeys seem pulled from a different era, both embarked within days of the first landing on the Moon: July 20th, 1969.
Filled with gale-force winds, backbreaking effort, menacing sharks, playful dolphins, awing natural beauty, great mishaps, failed equipment, hyperthermia, near-drowning, the fighting of mental and physical lethargy, creative problem-solving, phantom illusions on the water, and glorious moments of bliss, Completely Mad stands alongside other classics of ocean adventure.
With gripping and insightful prose, James R. Hansen brings to life Fairfax and McLean's expeditions, from their battle with the elements to their own inner demons. Completely Mad is a nail-biting, epic tale of endurance, and readers will be gripped until the end to find out who won.
More details
Person
James R. Hansen is professor emeritus of history at Auburn University. A former historian for NASA, Hansen is the author of fourteen books involving air and space and exploration. His 2005 book First Man, the only authorized biography of Neil Armstrong, has on two separate occasions appeared on the New York Times Bestseller list and has been translated into two dozen languages. In 1995 NASA nominated his book Spaceflight Revolution for a Pulitzer Prize, the only time the U.S. space agency has ever made such a nomination. His 2009 book, Truth, Lies, and O-Rings: Inside the Space Shuttle Challenger Disaster, has been called by reviewers "the definitive study" of the Challenger accident. He lives in Birmingham, Alabama.
Content
- Intro
- Title Page
- Maps
- Dedication
- Epigraph
- Prologue
- Part 1: Tom McClean and 'Super Silver'
- Chapter 1: Oars through the Harbor
- Chapter 2: Blow Me East
- Part 2: John Fairfax and 'Britannia'
- Chapter 3: Betting on the Trades
- Chapter 4: Goddess Venus
- Chapter 5: No Boy Scout
- Chapter 6: Shark Attack, Passing Ships, and Sylvia
- Chapter 7: The Big Gamble
- Chapter 8: Temptations
- Part 3: Rough Passage
- Chapter 9: Fegan's Orphanage
- Chapter 10: The Paratrooper
- Chapter 11: Into the Labrador Current
- Chapter 12: How Thick the Fog
- Chapter 13: Who Dares Wins
- Chapter 14: Unassisted
- Chapter 15: The Sunday Letter
- Chapter 16: Why?
- Chapter 17: Over You Go
- Chapter 18: First Six Months Are the Worst
- Chapter 19: 23,000 Oar Strokes a Day
- Chapter 20: Bluey
- Chapter 21: It Can't Last Forever
- Part 4: Come On, Florida!
- Chapter 22: Interview on a Yacht
- Chapter 23: A Victory, After All
- Part 5: Could It Be Ireland?
- Chapter 24: A Goner
- Chapter 25: Blacksod Bay
- Epilogue
- Photographs
- Postscript: John Fairfax
- Postscript: Tom McClean
- Essay on Sources
- Acknowledgments
- About the Author
- Bibliography
- Copyright
