Macomber - About the Author

Robert N. Macomber was fortunate—he grew up among the unspoiled islands of the southern Gulf coast of Florida before they were discovered and developed. The son of a sailor, he inherited that peculiar urge to see clear watery horizons and learned sailing at a very early age from his father. By the time he was seventeen, Macomber was the skipper of an Irwin twenty-four foot sloop, the Whistler, and racing offshore with his teenage crew. When he was nineteen, he won the coveted Summerset Regatta offshore series with a clean sweep of first place finishes.

Earning an Associates Degree in Social Sciences from Edison Community College, and a Bachelors Degree in Political Science from the University of South Florida (with a minor in history—his specialty area was the Caribbean) at Tampa slowed his sailing adventures a bit, but he quickly resumed his offshore cruising and racing. Gaining a reputation as a tough competitor while skippering the twenty-five foot Hunter sloop Incommunicado for ten years, Macomber also cruised extensively, exploring the little known places on the jungle coasts of lower Florida. During the Nineties, while master of the thirty-foot Hunter sloop Euphoria, he was commodore of the famous Caloosahatchee Marching and Chowder Society offshore fleet, and three-time consecutive winner of his division in the prestigious Summerset Regatta. He has earned over twenty-five trophies and awards for his offshore sailing throughout the years in Florida, Mexico, and the Bahamas. Not only a racer, Macomber is also well known for his cruising knowledge of out-of-the-way gunkholes and their histories.

In between sailing his own vessels offshore, Robert N. Macomber shipped aboard or visited ships of all types and ages around the world. He has sailed modern, gaff, and square-rigged sailing vessels. He’s also been aboard merchant and naval ships. Macomber has been on missions aboard an Israeli patrol boat in the Mediterranean, a Hungarian patrol boat on the Danube River, and United States Coast Guard cutters (USCGC Marlin, USCGC Point Steele, and 41-foot patrol boats) on offshore patrol in the Gulf of Mexico. With the Royal Navy of Great Britain, he has been the special guest of the Senior Chief Petty Officers of H.M.S. Victory, the wardroom officers of the aircraft carrier H.M.S. Invincible, and the faculty of the Royal Navy’s Britannia Naval College. Macomber has also been the guest of the H.M.S. London and H.M.S. Devon. Among his other accomplishments, he has had the unique experience of operating a Panama Canal tugboat for a day, and on another day running the lockmaster's controls at the Canal’s Pedro Miguel Locks.

    Making our way through the
    islands of San Carlos Bay,
    off the coast of lower Florida.

As guest of the chief petty officer’s mess, Macomber sailed aboard the vintage USCGC Eagle during the legendary Op Sail ’76, and aboard the venerable destroyer U.S.S. Spruance over twenty years later. He became a Shellback in 1982 aboard the freighter M/V Santa Mariana, crossing the Equator into the South Atlantic Ocean.

Robert N. Macomber uses his sea experience to assist him while writing and lecturing on maritime history. His descriptions of ships, sailors, and the sea ring true to those who’ve been there, and fascinate those who can only dream. His writing on maritime history includes newspapers and magazines in Florida, and national media such as Civil War Interactive Magazine and the U.S. Naval Institute’s Proceedings Magazine and Naval History Magazine. Each year, Macomber gives maritime history lectures to thousands of people around the world. His presentations have been given to sailing fleets and clubs, civic groups, museums, Civil War Round Table groups, ancestral groups, genealogical societies, military and naval officers, historical societies, writers’ groups, schools, libraries, literary events, and at book signings

Examining an original 1860 chart of the Caribbean--the same that naval officers would've used during the Civil War.

His work with museums and historical societies has been extensive also. In 2001, he was the recipient of the Florida State Genealogical Society’s prestigious Outstanding Achievement Award for his work in Florida’s maritime history. His maritime affiliations include the United States Naval Institute, the Naval Historical Foundation, the National Maritime Historical Society, the Civil War Sailors and Marines Association, the Bahamas Historical Society, the Steamship Historical Society of America, and various museums and historical societies in Florida. He has naval exhibits at two Florida museums, the Useppa Historical Museum, and the Museum of the Islands. A worldwide network of historians and naval, merchant, and private sailors assist him on research.

The great reviews of his books include historians, the media, literary reviewers, and authors—all of whom have been impressed with Macomber’s ability to bring the world of sailors to life for the reader. Sales spread rapidly across the America and around the world, garnering international acclaim for the Honor Series. Macomber now has readers in Mexico, Canada, Great Britain, France, Hungary, Russia, Australia, New Zealand, Belgium, and Germany. In addition to rave reviews, the author has received prestigious literary awards—At the Edge of Honor won the 2003 recipient of the Patrick D. Smith Literature Award for Best Historical Novel of Florida, and Point of Honor won the 2003 John Esten Cooke Literary Award for Best Work in Southern Fiction. Honorable Mention was a nominee for the American Library Association’s national 2005 Boyd Award for Military Fiction.

Beyond his research voyages, Macomber steams thousands of miles aboard the Queen Mary 2 (and now the new Queen Victoria) each year as guest author and lecturer. He is also guest author and lecturer aboard the Silver Sea fleet of ultra-luxury liners, a lecturer in the Distinguished Military Author Series at the United States Army’s Center for Army Analysis, a lecturer with the American History Forum, a maritime commentator for Florida PBS documentaries, and a feature writer for magazines. In 2006, Florida Monthly magazine named him one of the 22 Most Intriguing Floridians of the year, the only author chosen.

Macomber’s annual fall book tour takes him to book parties and reading festivals from Maryland to Miami. He’s been a featured author and speaker at the Miami International Book Fair, the St. Pete Times Reading Festival, Nashville’s Southern Festival of Books, Key West’s Literature and the Sea, the Southeast Independent Bookseller Association’s 2003 and 2006 booksellers’ conventions, SW Florida’s Reading Festival, the Naples Writers’ Conference, and many others. He also has put on writers’ conferences to benefit a cause he believes in strongly—Habitat for Humanity.

When not at sea, Macomber lives in a little bungalow at the quaint old fishing village of Matlacha Island, along that same lower Gulf coast of Florida where he grew up. For his newest novel each year, he hosts a weekend book launching on Pine Island, Florida, which has become the largest literary event in the islands. Each November it attracts hundreds of fans from around the United States who come for the fun of a laid-back Old Florida coastal celebration with live music, great food, and the chance to party with their favorite author.

Robert Macomber always looks forward to reader email and is available for media interviews—simply email him at macomber@robertmacomber.com!