Red Sky in Mourning: A True Story of Love, Loss, and Survival at Sea

by Tami Oldham Ashcraft

Book Overview

Picture yourself in a tropical climate, sailing out to sea with your fiance. Life is perfect; you're young and in love. Then picture everything going horribly wrong. You inadvertently sail into a hurricane, you're injured, and you wake up to find that your loved one is gone. Your boat's motor is shot and your masts have disappeared. Utterly alone, you're weeks from dry land.

Red Sky in Mourning is the story of Tami Oldham Ashcraft's...

• Format: Hardcover
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0786867914
• ISBN13: 9780786867912
• Release Date: June 2002
• Publisher: Hachette Books
• Length: 232 Pages
• Weight: 0.80 lbs.
• Dimensions: 0.8" x 5.8" x 8.7"
• Age Range: 17 to 18 years
• Grade Range: Grade 12 to Postsecondary

Customer Reviews

Important Life (and Sailing) Lessons Revealed

What a wonderful book, by a courageous woman. As I read the book, I felt that I was there with her during her struggles and triumphs. And the ending is very positive and doesn't leave the reader hanging. She's overcome a great deal in life at a young age, and has gone on to become a very solid and interesting wife and mother, I suspect. Yes, the book describes a real tragedy, the kind of thing that a sailor prays to avoid. However, there are real lessons to be found, such as equipment and design flaws aboard her boat, as well as the 'human factors' which she discusses openly. I've made purchases and upgrades to my boat (I liveaboard and cruise fulltime) based on her book and her lecture at the Annapolis sailboat show. Just buy the book, and you won't be sorry!

Hazana's owner writes

Tami has a great story. A young woman alone in the middle of the Pacific with the rig down. How did she manage to sail Hazana to the entrance of.... Well, you read it and find out. Hazana is alive and well and lives at slip 540 in the Ala Wai Harbor at Waikiki. "Hazana" is a Spanish word that means "a feat of strength". Tami and the boat live up to the name. Hazana is a Trintella 44 built in Holland by Anna Weaver. Aloha,Jeff

What a gift from Tami Oldham Ashcraft--A must read.

I have just finished reading Red Sky In Mourning. I have to say that no book has ever touched me in this way. Once I started to read it I could not even put the book down. I read it from cover to cover in my first sitting and then stayed up most of the night thinking about it. The next morning I awoke and read it again-it is incredible. The book is more than a story it is woman opening up her heart and letting it all out and letting the whole world in. Tami Oldham Ashcraft writes with such honesty and clarity it is as if you were there witnessing the events of her life rather than reading about them. I laughed, I cried, but most of all, this book warmed my heart to know there is love in this world like Tami and Richard shared-what an incredible person Tami Oldham Ashcraft must be. If you are going to buy one book this year I would highly recommend this on. I have already read my copy several times and will more than like read it several more.

Riveting

I have read more harrowing shipwrecks-at-sea story than this one perhaps, where odds of surviving were even less favorable. It also stands to reason that if you go sailing during a storm-racked area of the ocean, you may very well not make it back to land. But the story of Tami Oldham and what happened to her and Richard Sharp when they encountered Hurricane Raymond while sailing Hazana from Tahiti to California is absolutely compelling. This book has a richly detailed narrative; the story is woven skillfully using flashbacks to inform the reader of the history of these two people before they became caught up in a horrific experience.The story also contains lot more. When I first started this book, I was not sure if I liked Tami. Her character seemed rather headstrong. But character she had. You learn to like her a lot. From the admission of her fears and mistakes to the sadness and guilt she shares over Richard's death and to the responsibilites she resumes after rescue, you see a new person emerge. This is a person who experiences a very dramatic epiphany.Tami and Susea also brought Richard's character to the fore, right up to the last desperate moments of his life where he protects his fiance's, an act of what we call chivalry but that in his case, was truly part of who he must have been. Another element introduced in the story was The Voice that helped Tami throughout her 41 days alone at sea. We guess that it is really the common-sense side to Tami that is trying to keep her in balance during this time but guess is all you can do - we will never know for sure but as a reader, I found it a satisfying mystery. Perhaps,as Tami had wondered, I hoped it might be Richard himself.I cried towards the end of this book at Tami's symbolic letting go of this man. And again, when she mentions, years later, how her second daughter was born with the birth sac still intact - and what the midwife informs Tami is its significance.Despite the letting go, however, I can't help but believe that Tami has resurrected Richard in the eyes of her readers, a last kind act on her part to thank him for helping her make it to safety.

A Courageous Tale of Love and Survival

I met Tami at the St. Petersburg Sailboat Expo. She was at a table with several other authors talking about their books. She told me a little about "Red Sky in Mourning", and it sounded very interesting, but I moved on. The next day at the Expo, I went straight back and bought the book. I'm very glad I did. The story of this woman's stuggle to survive alone at sea, in what was left of the boat after the hurricane is truly inspiring. This experience alone would have been enough for a gripping adventure novel. But the author very tenderly intertwines her survival with flashbacks of her loving memories of her fiance, Richard. And then there was the voice that was always there to get her back on track when she got discouraged or wanted to give up the fight to survive. I would recommend this book to anyone who is interested in sailing, the sea, love, spirituality, and adventure.