If the British winter is leaving you bereft of boating entertainment, there’s a book for both sail and power aficionados that might be able to help. Called, ‘How to Design a Boat: Sail and Power’, it is part of the Adlard Coles Nautical Sailmate Series and has been a bestseller since first publication.Design a boat

This straightforward guide is designed to take you, step-by-step, through the stages of designing both power and sailing boats. Addressing a variety of boat types, small and large, ‘How to Design a Boat’ explains the reasons behind the procedures, through a series of designs that grow in size and complexity as the book progresses. Providing potential owners with a good basis to analyse and evaluate their own particular designs, it includes cruising yachts, fast powerboats, motor cruisers and commercial craft from the late, great John Teale. Priced at £14.99, this 144-page paperback looks well worth a shelf-space for the keen mariner, see Adlard Coles Nautical for details on this and other great sailing publications.