What do you think?
Rate this book
Amethyst
AMETHYST is a sailor's tale about living aboard a 23' sailboat for twelve years alone along the East Coast of the United States via the Inter-Coastal Waterway. It's an itinerary of summering in Massachusetts and wintering in Florida. Read this journey about Joseph Young's experience of sailing more than forty thousand miles.
About the Author Joseph Young was employed as a draftsman and a designer and he's an artist now. He's been painting oil on canvas since 1984. He traveled all over Europe on a motorcycle in 1971, and currently he's single and lives mostly alone.
About the Author Joseph Young was employed as a draftsman and a designer and he's an artist now. He's been painting oil on canvas since 1984. He traveled all over Europe on a motorcycle in 1971, and currently he's single and lives mostly alone.
486 pages, Hardcover
Published June 9, 2022
Ratings & Reviews
Friends & Following
Create a free account to discover what your friends think of this book!
Community Reviews
Displaying 1 of 1 review
April 9, 2025
‘Amethyst’ is an astonishing, one-of-a-kind sailor’s yarn, chronicling twelve years of living aboard a small, classically-beautiful ‘Stone Horse’ sailboat and twenty-four bi-annual coastal voyages up and down the Inland Waterway - 1700 miles each way - from Martha’s Vineyard to the Florida Keys and back.
Joseph Young’s long, lovely book is oddly gripping, particularly to a fellow-sailor who owned and loved a sister-ship at close of the twentieth century. I sailed my own little Stone Horse named ‘Wings,’ for thirty years and anchored in many of the same coves, fought my way over those tide-raced, storm-wracked inland sounds and dashed off-shore on my own ways north and south.
Joseph Young’s matter-of-fact narrative is formed of daily entries, as if from a logbook that also includes meals aboard and ashore, encounters with peripheral humans of all stamps, all along the coast, and his hair-raising sailing exploits in between and in all weathers. This is pure passage-making on a relentless schedule driven by the changes of season and the need to get south or north, without heat or air-conditioning in his miniature, sit-d0wn-only cabin, before the weather makes living aboard unbearable.
Young’s anorexic funds, His simplicity of expression, his almost Asperger’s-like fixations on the details of sailing and maintaining and improving his tiny yacht, were riveting for me. Over all those years, Joe made his way in the 1990’s over 40,000 miles of notoriously ‘thin’ water with no depth-sounder and of course ran aground countless times, as I did with an older, likewise ill-equipped boat. Both he and I took years to finally acquired gps. I’m 6’6” and only sailed Wings for weeks-at-a-time. Joe is 5’4” and Amethyst was his home.
I liked the kindle edition enough to hunt up a hard-back edition - a big beautiful book with a few vital photos of Young’s boat and himself. If you’re a hard-core coastal sailor and still have dreams about your old passages and the rush of the tide up the East River and the mooing of cows yards away on the Dismal Swamp Canal, you may enjoy this long stream of Joseph Young’s sailorly consciousness and empathize with his essential, oh-so-human loneliness.
Joseph Young’s long, lovely book is oddly gripping, particularly to a fellow-sailor who owned and loved a sister-ship at close of the twentieth century. I sailed my own little Stone Horse named ‘Wings,’ for thirty years and anchored in many of the same coves, fought my way over those tide-raced, storm-wracked inland sounds and dashed off-shore on my own ways north and south.
Joseph Young’s matter-of-fact narrative is formed of daily entries, as if from a logbook that also includes meals aboard and ashore, encounters with peripheral humans of all stamps, all along the coast, and his hair-raising sailing exploits in between and in all weathers. This is pure passage-making on a relentless schedule driven by the changes of season and the need to get south or north, without heat or air-conditioning in his miniature, sit-d0wn-only cabin, before the weather makes living aboard unbearable.
Young’s anorexic funds, His simplicity of expression, his almost Asperger’s-like fixations on the details of sailing and maintaining and improving his tiny yacht, were riveting for me. Over all those years, Joe made his way in the 1990’s over 40,000 miles of notoriously ‘thin’ water with no depth-sounder and of course ran aground countless times, as I did with an older, likewise ill-equipped boat. Both he and I took years to finally acquired gps. I’m 6’6” and only sailed Wings for weeks-at-a-time. Joe is 5’4” and Amethyst was his home.
I liked the kindle edition enough to hunt up a hard-back edition - a big beautiful book with a few vital photos of Young’s boat and himself. If you’re a hard-core coastal sailor and still have dreams about your old passages and the rush of the tide up the East River and the mooing of cows yards away on the Dismal Swamp Canal, you may enjoy this long stream of Joseph Young’s sailorly consciousness and empathize with his essential, oh-so-human loneliness.
Displaying 1 of 1 review