Top 10 books on the sea

Bella Bathurst's first published book was The Lighthouse Stevensons (1999), an account of the construction of the Scottish lighthouses by the ancestors of Robert Louis Stevenson; it was named one of the List Magazine's "100 Best Scottish Books of all time." Her second book was a novel, Special (2002); it was followed by The Wreckers (2005), a history of shipwrecking and maritime mischief around the coast of Britain.

In 2005 she named her top ten books on the sea for the Guardian. One title on the list:

Moby Dick by Herman Melville

The original, and still the best. Melville spent time both on whaling ships and a man-of-war, and it shows. His masterpiece is as much an education in 19th-century shipboard life as it is the story of man against leviathan.

Read about another item on the list.

Moby-Dick also appears among John Mullan's list of ten of the best tattoos in literature, Susan Cheever's five best books about obsession, Christopher Buckley's best books, Jane Yolen's five most important books, Chris Dodd's best books, Augusten Burroughs' five most important books, Norman Mailer's top ten works of literature, David Wroblewski's five most important books, Russell Banks' five most important books, and Philip Hoare's top ten books about whales.

--Marshal Zeringue