Moderate Becoming Good Later: Sea Kayaking the Shipping Forecast

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One of the most moving parts of the book for me was how you get a real insight into this man’s unique and mind-bending take on life.

Moderate Becoming Good Later is a wonderfully salty adventure, a quixotic odyssey driven by equal parts grit and good humour around the stormy shores of western Europe. The book starts off sharing family history, explaining health conditions and why he wanted to do this, a rather clever method was done to share this. Thrilling and moving in equal parts, it should inspire us all to get out into the world and embrace its beauty. Informative, humorous and emotional, it left me feeling sad but also really inspired and motivated to tackle my own adventure, what ever the size! He had a contagious wonder for the world, spotting a dolphin and taking a moment to appreciate it existing with him in that moment.

On a journey that took him to stormiest and most tranquil stretches of our seas, he found stories behind the familiar names and imagined environments of the well-loved BBC broadcast. For those not familiar this is a radio broadcast of weather conditions for those on the sea but has become over time a rather calming British institution that people listen to even if they aren't near the sea. One of the most moving and affecting books I've read in a long time, it is profound, thoughtful, fascinating and, above all, beautiful. But I got tired of being thrown from one place to the other, sometimes multiple ones in one paragraph (especially in the last chapters) like all he was doing was kayaking as fast as he could and not stopping to admire where he was which I know wasn't true.

Lots to learn and some amazing places visited and it has definitely spurred me to want to see more of the world once more and live for the moment. Obviously, I understand how hard it must have been to finish writing a book someone else started when Katie didn't even experience what her brother lived through but at the very least, maybe it would've been worth it for her to go to the places he went and try and picture what he felt by being there, instead of looking at photos on Google. This incredibly moving story weaves together one family's story and shows the sense of hope and love that can be found through adventure even when things don't go according to plan.

I read this wonderful book often with a lump in my throat, many tears in my eyes and a racing pulse, because of the pure adventure of his inspirational physical and emotional endeavours.

Written by Toby's sister Katie from his extensive notes and recordings after his untimely death, Moderate Becoming Good Later is both an epic adventure - sometimes choppy, constantly moving - and a personal voyage of discovery that includes old friends and new, plenty of wildlife, and the ever-present sea. Exceptionally beautiful and moving, a book that conjures connection to people, places and the ocean with the immediacy, grace and clarity of a kayak cutting through sea spray. At the beginning, in chapters Toby managed to complete before his death, he describes his upbringing, family life and reasons for taking on the challenge. Lyrical descriptions, engaging reporting of meetings with the people he meets on his travels, scary episodes in rougher seas that ordinarily would give me nightmares, all come together to make this a thoroughly delightful and compulsive read.As enduring as any ancient Scandinavian saga, this is a candidly honest tale of a risk-laden, yet existentially meaningful and powerful sea kayaking project.