About the Book    The alluring sea beckons sailors from every corner of the earth. They ply the seven seas, traverse the world´s great lakes and waterways, meander along rivers and canals, and tuck into safe harbours. Among these travellers are parents with children. For one year, a family from the Canadian prairie jumped off the deep end, and joined them.
   Greetings from Cool Breezes is not just about sand, surf, salt and sails, or even sunny ports-of-call; it´s about what it takes, and what it´s like, to be away for a year from the multi-tasking merry-go-round of North American culture. This book relates the experience of a landlubber family out of its element that learns not only how to become liveaboards, but also to live in the moment.
   This book tells the true sea adventures and misadventures of the Kirwin crew: parents Patrick and Jeananne, their four children Erin (12), Ben (10), Liam (9) and Meara (4), and their Labrador retriever Jasper. In August 2000, they bought a catamaran called Cool Breezes and sailed, for a year and a day, along the eastern U.S. seaboard and the rugged north coast of Cuba, and among the many dazzling archipelagos of the Bahamas. A faithful account of their trials and tribulations was reported via e-mail missives back home, each bearing the subject line Greetings from Cool Breezes. Those e-mails form the backbone of this book.

About the Author    Jeananne Kathol Kirwin lives in Edmonton, Alberta with her husband and four children. Although she is a practicing lawyer and erstwhile sailor, her childhood dream to become a writer was rekindled during the sailing sabbatical that is the subject of this book. Articles that she wrote about the practical aspects of her family’s journey were published in sailing magazines during the journey. Her travel writing has been short-listed for the CBC Literary Awards competition, and appears in an anthology entitled Outside of Ordinary (Second Story Press, 2005). Ms. Kirwin holds an Honours English degree from Yale University and a Juris Doctor from University of Toronto Law School. She writes occasionally for legal publications, sits on the boards of several charities, and volunteers in her community.