When you think of storylines that would make an obvious, easy transformation to a stage musical, the idea of a woman who rows solo across the Atlantic would — it's fair to say — not be at the top of the list.

But that was exactly what appealed to writer and director Daniel Goldstein about turning Tori Murden McClure's book "A Pearl in the Storm: How I Found My Heart in the Middle of the Ocean" into a musical-theater piece.

"I am very attracted to putting things onstage that should not be onstage," he says. "The challenge of writing a musical where the main character is in a boat most of the time, (actually) all of the time, was really thrilling to me."

The idea bubbled up after Goldstein asked his friend, musician Dawn Landes, about possibly collaborating on a musical. When they met to pitch ideas for a joint project, he recalls Landes brought a copy of "A Pearl in the Storm" and said, "I don't know how this would be a musical, but it's a great story. Maybe this could be something."

Goldstein read it and agreed. They got to work on it in 2014. Now, "Row" is one of three musicals featured this weekend in Goodspeed's Festival of New Musicals.

Goldstein has worked on many musicals over the years. He has directed a number of shows at Goodspeed, most recently 2016's "Anything Goes," and he directed the 2011 Broadway revival of "Godspell." He has written the musicals "Unknown Soldier" and "The Song of Songs" with composer Michael Friedman.

"Row" is the first foray into musical theater for singer-songwriter Landes, who is known for her folk sound. She's released numerous albums, and her songs have been used on such TV series as "The Good Wife" and "House." She has toured solo internationally as well as with such artists as Bryan Ferry. She has performed at Lincoln Center's renowned American Songbook Series.

Goldstein says of McClure's story and "Row," "I found myself really drawn to the notion of someone who has to take a journey across an ocean in order to make peace with your own flaws."

He sees that as a metaphor for what individuals do on a daily basis.

"The ability to, I would say, forgive yourself or recognize your own humanity as a part of your growth — that's as hard for anyone as rowing across an ocean," he says.

And, Landes points out, McClure didn't make it across on her first attempt and so had to try a second time before she became, in 1999, the first woman and the first American to row alone across the Atlantic.

"That's the point, I think, that she wasn't able to do it the first time," Goldstein says. "She failed at it the way all of us do. I think what feels so emotionally charged about the story is that we as an audience can make the connection to rowing across the ocean both as the superhuman feat of rowing across an ocean, which, God only knows, you couldn't pay me enough money to do, but ... (and) as a metaphor for how hard it is to move through your life, whatever those storms are ..."

Reading "A Pearl in the Storm" wasn't the first time Landes had heard of McClure. Landes grew up in Louisville, Kentucky, and remembers, when she was in high school, reading about McClure's first row. McClure also lived in Louisville and left her job as a project manager there to make her first attempt to cross the Atlantic. (Landes was a rower herself and was on the New York University team when she was a student there.)

Once they agreed to pursue the "Pearl in the Storm" project, Landes and Goldstein got the rights from McClure, who also supplied them with additional material, including letters, videos and diaries.

At first, the plan was for the show's first act to be set on sea and the second to be on land. That second half featured such life events as when McClure fell in love with the man who would become her husband.

That split, though, didn't pan out.

"What we discovered was the first act felt very different than the second act. The first act was this really exciting adventure story, and the second act felt like a romantic comedy," Goldstein says. "So while it was delightful, and people (who saw it) enjoyed it, everyone was just waiting for her to get back onto the ocean. Because we know she's going to do it again because you're not writing a book about someone who didn't finish."

So the duo restructured the piece so the second act matches the first in that it's all about her journey. Now, the first act features her first row, and the second act is about her second. Each boasts flashbacks and moments from different parts of her life. In the first act, those tend to be about her childhood and her past. In the second, they are about the year between her rows, when she met her husband and when she worked for Muhammad Ali to help create the Muhammad Ali Center in Louisville.

As for the challenges of bringing this unique story to the stage, Landes says, "There is a device we're using, which is she's talking to the video camera the whole time because she did take video a lot of her journey." The character thus narrates most of her actions in the show.

A theater production, of course, can't exactly recreate the kind of storms McClure encountered on her initial row. But Goldstein says that, when he works as a stage director, reading a stage direction like "The boat then flips over, and she is upside down" "is thrilling to me because you actually can't do it, or if you do, you've spent $2 million on a trick that's going to go slow and not be very exciting. But what theater does that TV and movies don't is it requires the participation of the imagination of the audience. ... And musicals even more so because people don't sing in real life."

"Row" has had an inspiring effect on audiences. Landes says that after a concert presentation at Joe's Pub in New York City, people told her, "'When you leave the theater, you feel like you've got to go out and do something.' It's so exciting to be able to give that to people."