English firefighter Paul Hopkins (55) had recovered from a brain haemorrhage and entrepreneur Phil Pugh (65) was renowned for undertaking extreme physical challenges in honour of his son when they rowed into Antigua in a fourth-hand wooden rowing boat in February 2020.
The pair, who undertook the transatlantic challenge on a tight budget, had no family there to greet them after 70 days at sea.
However, Irish-born author and former television director Niamh McAnally and her husband Gary Krieger were there on their yacht, Freed Spirit, and the result is a compelling book which records how two “disparate alpha males” learned to work together by focussing on solutions rather than problems during a life-changing high-seas voyage.
McAnally and Krieger spoke to Wavelengths about how the book came about. You can listen to the podcast here and details of the book are below.
Flares Up: A Story Bigger than the Atlantic by Niamh McAnally with a foreword by Jeremy Irons ( Pitch Publishing £14.99) is available in print and on audiobook form, and more details are on McAnally’s website
A video of Jeremy Irons speaking at the Dublin launch of Niamh McAnally's book FLARES UP is below.