Forty-seven yachts crossed the starting line for the GBP 100,000 Tristar, the first single-handed ocean race to be held in the northern winter - 8,000 miles of sailing from Plymouth to the Azores, the West Indies, Newfoundland and back to Plymouth. To compete, Martin Savage gave up everything - left his job, sold his house, pledged himself to the hilt and lost his girl friend. But he was on the way to achieving his greatest ambition. Forty hours out at sea, hove-to in a gale, he found he had a stowaway, a girl in flight from an unhappy love affair. He was no longer single-handed - if she was discovered he would be disqualified. If she was discovered...Sea Fever tells the story of this epic race, of the extraordinary relationship between the yachtsman driven by a compulsive obsession to win, and the girl whose presence on board faced him with ruin. Was she prisoner or ally? Did he want her dead or alive? As the race wore on Savage's chances improved, the stakes grew higher and tension on board reached breaking point. The glory and terror of a small ketch battling against the huge seas and fierce winds of the North Atlantic in winter is vividly evoked, as are psychological and emotional pressures on a man and woman inescapably confined in a tiny space, their moods alternating between fear and elation, hatred and resentment, love and desire. With its strange beginning, its sustained tension and dramatic climax, Sea Fever is not only Anthony Trew's most unusual story of the sea, but quite possibly his best.