An excerpt from Grand Ambition: An Extraordinary Yacht, The People Who Built It, And The Millionaire Who Can’t Really Afford It by G. Bruce Knecht, best-selling author of The Proving Ground.

Evan Marshall, one of the world’s most sought-after yacht designers, was in his London office in the fall of 2006, hunched over a door-sized desk that was covered with schematic drawings of Lady Linda. While his iPod shuffled through a collection of more than five thousand songs, a mix of soul, jazz, and rock from the 1960s to the present, he rarely lifted his head. When he did, it was only to look at his laptop, which held electronic versions of the same plans, together with engineering specifications.