Noise
by Hal Clement

Description:
Kainui is one of a pair of double planets in a binary star system. Mike Hoani has come there to study the language of the colonists, to analyze its evolution in the years since settlement.

Kainui is an ocean planet. Although settled by Polynesians, it is anything but a tropical paradise. The ocean is 1,700 miles deep, with no solid ground anywhere. The population is scattered in cities on floating artifical islands with no fixed locations. The atmosphere isn't breathable, and lightning, waterspouts, and tsunamis are constant. Out on the great planetary ocean, self-sufficiency is crucial, and far from any floating city, on a small working-family ship, anything can happen. There are, for instance, pirates. Mike's academic research turns into an exotic nautical adventure unlike anything he could have imagined.