“A barking good read. A must for all sailors and dog-lovers” – Tom Cunliffe

A doctor spoke carefully. Long stay. Months in intensive care. A smaller, more cautious life. Pete listened, signed himself out, walked to the marina, and climbed back aboard his yacht.

Seven years later, he was ready to sail around Britain. He just needed a crew: a detective trying to escape London, a Bernese Mountain Dog who refuses to go to the toilet onboard, and a chatbot convinced it can navigate.

What could possibly go wrong?

When yacht racer and detective Jenny Whelan joins her partner Pete aboard their ten-metre yacht Rimau, the plan sounds simple enough: sail 2,000 miles around Britain, pass through the Caledonian Canal, and make it home before winter arrives.

There is just one complication. Their 37kg Bernese Mountain Dog, Svea, needs to get ashore every few hours, forcing the crew to rethink everything from passage planning to harbour stops. Then Jenny introduces an experimental new crew member aboard: artificial intelligence.

Armed with paper charts, tidal calculations, old-school seamanship and a chatbot that is fast, confident, and sometimes dangerously wrong, the crew set off anticlockwise around the British Isles in a voyage that quickly becomes about far more than sailing.

From torn sails off Whitby and violent tidal races in the Menai Strait to storm-bound marinas, broken autopilots, sleepless solo watches, and dog-friendly pub hunts, Dogsail is a funny, honest and sharply observed account of modern adventure at sea.

Along the way, old certainties are tested. Technology clashes with tradition. Relationships are stretched by exhaustion, weather and close quarters. And somewhere between the tides, the arguments, and the enduring power of a dog’s bladder, a reluctant dog-owner discovers an unexpected friendship.

Part sailing memoir, part travel adventure, and part experiment in trust between human judgement and artificial intelligence, Dogsail is a story about risk, resilience, companionship, and what happens when you stop waiting for the perfect moment and simply leave the dock.

Perfect for readers who love sailing adventures, travel memoirs, life at sea, cruising stories, and tales of unlikely crews finding their way together.