Nothing But Blue

In the summer of 1979, Diane Meyer Lowman, a nineteen-year-old Middlebury College student, embarked on a ten-week working trip aboard a German container ship with a mostly male crew. The journey would take her from New York to Australia and New Zealand and back, through the lush Panama Canal, to a Koala sanctuary and a Maori Museum.

She swabbed decks and mended linens, navigated not only the Panama Canal, but perhaps more harrowingly the awkward and sometimes threatening mostly male shipboard society and its politics. The voyage would forever change her perspective on the world and her place in it. She left the port of New York a subservient, malleable girl and sailed back past the Statue of Liberty on her return as a more confident, independent, resilient young woman who’d learned to stand on her own two feet even if the roughest of waters.

Author: Diane Meyer Lowman

Publication Date: November 13, 2018

Categories: Fall 2018, Memoir

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About the Author

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2019 Next Generation Indie Book Awards: Finalist in Memoir (Other)

“A memoir of a teen’s transformation one summer on a cargo ship, Nothing But Blue is written with shimmering prose and an authentic voice. Never at a loss for a metaphor, Diane writes with precise detail, rendering her adventures at sea so vividly, I felt like I was on the ship with her, seeing nothing but blue.”
—Marcelle Soviero, Editor-in-Chief of Brain, Child and Brain, Teen magazines

“Hands down one of the best adventure stories I’ve ever read, Nothing But Blue is a page-turning, sometimes hilarious always uplifting memoir that reminds us of the tenacity and strength of the human spirit. This is the memoir to read when you need the unbridled inspiration to break out into unchartered territory so that you can discover the brave and beautiful soul that lies in the core of every women. A must read.”
—Suzanne Kingsbury, author of The Summer Fletcher Greel Loved Me

“Diane Lowman, in Nothing But Blue, translates with exquisite metaphors the isolation and wonder of her three-month journey on a bright red container ship from New York to Australia and back through the Panama Canal. ‘I had this sense of being dropped in place like a rag doll . . . I had no context to make sense of any of this,’ she writes, and by learning to read the dynamics of the German crew, she makes sense of her place. With tremendous clarity, she recognizes the elements of her identity and her profound strength. In finding what makes her whole, she triumphs on her heroine’s journey.”
—Kate Gray, author of Carry the Sky

“Witty and inspiring, heartfelt and empowering, Nothing But Blue grabs readers from the first page and doesn’t let go until the final word. Diane Lowman has crafted a riveting odyssey filled with luminous analogies, cinematic descriptions, and extraordinary adventures. It may just inspire you to take a journey of your own.”
—Sally Allen, Founder & Editor, Books, Ink.

About the Author

Diane Meyer Lowman’s essays have appeared in many publications, including O, The Oprah Magazine; Brain, Child; Brevity Blog; and When Women Waken. She also writes a weekly column called My Life on the Post Road for Books, Ink (books.hamletlhub.com). She’s explored other forms of literary expression in nearly 1,000 haiku poems and many essays about all of Shakespeare’s plays. Lowman teaches yoga, provides nutritional counseling, and tutors Spanish. She recently received an MA in Shakespeare Studies at the University of Birmingham’s Shakespeare Institute.