Boat Kid: How I Survived Swimming with Sharks, Being Homeschooled, and Growing Up on a Sailboat
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About this ebook
"Boat Kid" is the engaging memoir of what it’s like to grow up aboard a sailboat. Throughout the 1980s and 90s, Melanie’s family lived aboard a 47-foot sailboat, spending their summers along the US East Coast and their winters in the Bahamas. Melanie and her sister were homeschooled, the family fished for dinner and made their own bread, but her parents were far from hippie dropouts. Despite their unique lifestyle, her parents were determined to raise proper young ladies while surrounded by sea-gypsies, mystics, nudists, boat bums, sharks, and smugglers.
And the cruising life was not all fun in the sun. The family had to work hard to pay for their way of life. They dodged hurricanes, federal agents, and bullying land kids. And as her father published articles about how living on a boat brings families together, Melanie secretly struggled with an eating disorder, the alienation of being a boat kid, and her developing sexuality. "Boat Kid" weaves all this together into a story about a girl who, once all is said and done, simply wants her own boat and the freedom to live her own life.
Melanie paints a vivid picture of family life aboard a sailboat without drowning the reader in the technical details of sailing. "Boat Kid" strikes a perfect balance between coming-of-age story and sea tale enjoyable for boaters and land-lovers alike.
"Boat Kid" is the Middle Grades version (ages 9-15) of Melanie's "Boat Girl: A Memoir of Youth, Love & Fiberglass."
Melanie Neale
Melanie Neale, the author of Boat Girl: A Memoir of Youth, Love, and Fiberglass, grew up aboard a 47’ sailboat traveling the US East Coast and Bahamas. She earned a BFA in Creative Writing from Eckerd College in 2002 and an MFA in Creative Writing from Florida International University in 2006. She has taught college, detailed boats, captained and crewed on boats, coordinated marketing events, and scooped minnows in a bait shop. Melanie currently works as the Director of Career Services for a private art college in northern Florida, where she lives with her husband and daughter. Melanie has been published in many literary journals and magazines, including Soundings, Seaworthy, Southwinds, GulfStream, Latitudes & Attitudes, The Miami Herald’s Tropical Life Magazine, Balancing the Tides, The Georgetown Review, RumBum.com and Florida Humanities. Her “Short Story” column appeared bimonthly in Cruising World Magazine from 2006 to 2009.
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