This book is about learning to sail. It follows the techniques perfected at the world-famous Annapolis Sailing School, where thousands of people just like you have learned to take tiller in hand and harness the wind. Youll learn your way around a boat--what its parts are called, what they do, and how to use them to ride the wind wherever you want to go.

Read this book, spend some time on a boat, and practice your new skills, and pretty soon youll be a sailor, one of a select group of people who think theres nothing finer than hiking out to windward in a close-hauled dinghy--racing against friends or a neighboring sailing club, or alone and just for the fun of it.

Goodman explores class, community, and culture through the lens of a party.