"Sunday morning, November 14, 1999 treated the one-man crew of La Vie en Rose to a reassuring sunrise. Not a trace of red tinged the sky." 48 hours later Carl Wake, steering La Vie en Rose, and Jean Jacques Llobregat, and Steve Rigby, three strangers each in their own vessels, would wind up in the same patch of the Caribbean as Hurricane Lenny's 150 mile-an-hour winds screamed around them. At least two of them would catch sight of each other.

At the Mercy of the Sea (November 2006) is not only a suspenseful recreation of a man's death in the grip of unforgiving nature - a Class 5 Hurricane - but the story of one man's deep love of sailing and a moving illumination of his personal drives and dreams.

Author John Kretschmer taught Carl Wake how to sail, helped him choose his boat, and advised him about when to sail to the Caribbean. He interviewed friends, family, and associates of the victims, obtained transcripts of their radio calls during the storm, and analyzed the hurricane with the help of the National Hurricane Center. He draws on his own vast sea experience to take readers into the heart of a hurricane in a small, frail boat.

Carl Wake manages to rescue Steve Rigby - an amazing act of seamanship and courage - but ultimately all three boats succumb in conditions no small craft could survive. At the Mercy of the Sea retraces these sailors' journeys through life and across oceans to find meaning in the improbable intersection of three lives in those terrible hours.

About the Author:

John Kretschmer is a travel and sailing columnist for The Miami Herald, a longtime contributing editor to Sailing Magazine, and writes regularly for Southern Boating and Cruising World. He has logged more than 200,000 offshore sailing miles, including 15 transatlantic and two transpacific passages. He has weathered several storms at sea, and teaches aspiring bluewater voyagers in seminars, lectures, and training voyages. John lives aboard a 47-foot cutter in Florida. He and his student Carl Wake, the subject of this book, were close friends.

"The tale of Carl Wake and the hurricane that was waiting for him goes straight to the heart of the greatest sea stories: they are not about man against the sea, but man against himself. John Kretschmer's book is as perfectly shaped and flawlessly written as such a story can be. In addition to being the best depiction I have ever read of what it is like to be inside a hurricane at sea, At the Mercy of the Sea is as moving a story of a man's failure and redemption as can be found anywhere in the literature of the sea. This book is surely destined to become a classic."

--Peter Nichols, author, Sea Change and A Voyage for Madmen

"John Kretschmer is a first-class seaman who is also a fine writer. Once begun, his vivid and powerful narrative is impossible to put down."

--Derek Lundy, author, Godforsaken Sea and The Way of a Ship

"At the Mercy of the Sea kept me plunging ahead to the tragic end and left me feeling humbled and lucky to be alive. I felt I knew Carl Wake, because John Kretschmer found in him an archetype - an aging sailor with an age-old dream."

--Jim Carrier, transatlantic sailor and author, The Ship and the Storm: Hurricane Mitch and the Loss of the Fantome

"Gathering his tools as a loyal friend, a master mariner, and a natural story-teller, John Kretschmer has crafted an unforgettable tale of high-seas adventure, salvation, and loss. A remarkable book, impossible to put down."

--Herb McCormick, sailing journalist

"John Kretschmer's account of three fellow captains whose lives converge in one of history's most erratic hurricanes builds like the storm itself. Detail after detail reveals the sailors' personal histories, their foibles, their goals, and finally their tragic miscalculations. With expert analysis and taut writing, he draws readers into that mad storm. You can't turn away. You keep reading until it breaks your heart."