Newlyweds Afloat

A funny memoir of falling in love, getting married, and moving aboard a boat.

 

A young woman meets an amazing guy, falls in love, and they move in together. Straightforward enough, right? Except he lives on a boat—a 38-foot trawler, docked in Chicago. Their relationship is intensified by living in a tiny space, and by the never-ending quirks of the boat, who becomes a third party in the marriage. There are electrical failures, pump failures, big waves, and freezing winters . . . not to mention the attack goose. Felicia Schneiderhan has a fine literary sensibility and manages to be both funny and deeply serious in writing about boats and love and relationships. This book will delight any boater, or any land-dweller dreaming of escape.

“Newlyweds Afloat is a love story between a woman, a man, and his boat. Felicia Schneiderhan recounts with humor and skill the story of her transformation from a Chicago apartment dweller to a newly married river rat on Chicago’s waterways. With an eye for the absurd, she reveals the ups and downs, joys and challenges, and day-to-day logistics of living aboard a 38-foot trawler named Mazurka—even in winter. Newlyweds Afloat is full of high-seas drama and flat water reflection plus cats and lots and lots of heart. I could not stop reading it.”

—Julie Buckles, author of Paddling to Winter

“Newlyweds Afloat is a wife’s story of learning to be the other woman, with a man who loves his boat. This detailed account takes an honest look at many of the difficulties of life aboard a trawler, and learning to love his boat as much as he does.”

—Ed Robinson, author of Leap of Faith: Quit Your Job and Live on a Boat

About the author: Felicia Schneiderhan grew up boating on the Mississippi River, the daughter of a nun caught by a fisherman. Her fiction and nonfiction have appeared in dozens of magazines and journals, including Lake Superior Magazine and PassageMaker Magazine. She currently lives on land in Northern Minnesota with her husband and three small tsunamis.