It is both an adventure story and a coming-of-age story in a world that appeared idyllic but in reality was hugely challenging.

She required seven operations, and there was no anaesthetic in the hospital of the tiny island that was their first land after the storm. As the boat lurched on to its side, my fingers let go and I was flung against the ceiling and back on to the galley wall. Suzanne, by then seven, and her brother would be tutored on board by their parents, both qualified teachers. What I found, when I mustered enough courage to look back, was that many parts of my childhood were worse than I’d been willing to admit. The contrast between having to suffer the limited options permitted by sailing parents and then sudden independence (abandonment) are stark.He leaned over my bunk, his eyes underlined with curved shadows, his cheeks and nose red and inflamed. How many people have you ever known whose parents sat them down, aged six (Suzanne), and five (Jonathan) and told them they were leaving their lives in England to spend three years sailing around the world, retracing voyages made by Captain James Cook? I also wrote to every university I’d ever heard of, asking them if they would let me apply to be a student.

Unlike Westover, however, the writing itself is not as memorably compelling, although the narrative is, if overlong. Aged just seven, Suzanne Heywood set sail with her parents and brother on a three-year voyage around the world. Untill I read this book , I thought that getting into the world’s best universities and top jobs was mainly about top schools,top grades and top technical skills. When I set sail from England with my parents, brother and three crew members in the summer of 1976, I was seven and thought the trip was going to be like an extended, exciting summer holiday.The ‘Wavewalker’s’ time in Dawlish is soon coming to end with the piling work scheduled to be completed mid to late February.