‘A fabulous compendium of terror and disaster, expertise and courage’
ADAM NICOLSON, author of The Seabird’s Cry

‘Evokes panoramas of sea and land with confident flair’
WALL STREET JOURNAL

What’s in a cloud? What separates a tropical storm from a winter blizzard? And what exactly is El Niño? Elliot Rappaport, a captain of traditional sailing ships, has spent three decades at sea, where understanding weather is the difference between life and death.

From the icy seas of Greenland to the turbulent waters of the Strait of Gibraltar, from the powerful squalls near the equator to the ancient Polynesian explorers who ventured eastward against trade winds, Reading the Glass combines science and memoir to reveal the remarkable story of how weather has shaped our oceans, our history and ourselves.

‘An extraordinary book by a modern-day Melville . . . I can’t recommend this book highly enough’
MARK VANHOENACKER, author of Skyfaring

‘A gripping account of what weather is, how it feels to be in the middle of it, and what we can expect going forward!’
BILL MCKIBBEN, author of The End of Nature

‘Relatable, reflective, and humorous . . . a genuinely immersive read’ Countryman

‘Date, time, wind, waves, pressure, temperature, and cloud cover. Like pilots, roofers and mountain climbers, mariners are obsessed with the weather, immersed in it as part of their daily calculus . . . Make good decisions, mariners are fond of saying. If there were a corollary to this, it might offer: When the weather gods show you their cards, don’t miss them’

Weather can be the difference between life and death for a sailor, something Captain Elliot Rappaport knows very well, having spent almost his whole adult life at sea.

A professional ship’s captain, with over thirty years of experience sailing traditional vessels, ‘tall ships’, Captain Rappaport has travelled around 100,000 sea miles, in all four hemispheres, and spent a great many hours watching the weather unfold.

In Reading the Glass he shares all he has learned about the weather at sea, gives us an inside look at the world of seafaring, a vocation much more than a job, and shares some hard-won mariner’s wisdom: if you are headed for Greenland in July, expect at least one storm, and wait until after Christmas to sail to New Zealand’s South Island; pack $3000-worth of fruit and veg for a two-month journey at sea; and the most valuable member of the crew is first of all the engineer, and secondly the cook!

Reading the Glass is a gorgeous blend of drily funny stories of life on a ship, the history of seafaring, stories of explorers, discoveries, epic storms, and the science of weather.

‘An extraordinary book by a modern-day Melville . . . I can’t recommend this book highly enough’ Mark Vanhoenacker