The Brilliant Abyss
True Tales of Exploring the Deep Sea, Discovering Hidden Life and Selling the Seabed
Format:Paperback
Publisher:Bloomsbury Publishing PLC
Published:4th Aug '22
Should be back in stock very soon
In The Brilliant Abyss, readers explore our complex relationship with the deep sea, highlighting exploration, exploitation, and environmental challenges.
The deep sea represents the last great wilderness on Earth, a realm that has long captured the imaginations of myth-makers and storytellers. In The Brilliant Abyss, readers embark on a journey through the depths of this mysterious oceanic world, where scientists are uncovering bizarre, unknown species and exploring the potential for new medicines. With an average depth of 12,000 feet and deeper chasms, the ocean serves as a frontier for groundbreaking discoveries that can reshape our understanding of life itself.
This book delves into humanity's complex relationship with the deep sea, highlighting our dual motivations to explore and exploit its resources. It reflects on the golden age of discovery we are currently experiencing while also addressing the historical context that has shaped our interactions with this hidden world. The narrative captures the tension between two groups of deep-sea explorers: those driven by curiosity and knowledge, and those motivated by commercial interests and profit.
The Brilliant Abyss culminates in a forward-looking perspective on the environmental challenges facing the deep ocean, such as mining and pollution. It emphasizes the urgent need for awareness and action to protect this vital ecosystem, urging readers to consider their role in the unfolding story of the deep sea. Through a chronological exploration, the book invites us to reflect on how we can navigate the future of our oceans responsibly.
So comprehensive and insightful that it will be a long time before it’s surpassed … It is hard to imagine a more timely or important book than The Brilliant Abyss. Carefully conceived and luminously written, it is certain to be a bestseller, which gives me hope that its urgent message might help save the world. * New Statesman *
Scales’s approach isenthralling and richly expressed and highlights how closely our lives depend on the deep. * Observer *
Scales’s great gift is for transmuting our awe at the wonders of the deep sea into a kind of quiet rage that they could soon be no more … The deep, she argues, is too vulnerable, and too crucial to the working of the planet to blindly ransack. * New York Times Book Review *
Accessible, enjoyable and written with infectious passion, this book is a compelling guide to a fascinating and often overlooked part of our planet. * The Week *
Fascinating … The Brilliant Abyss is a manifesto for change as much as it is a description of an ecological crisis. Its overall effect – to insist that what’s already down there matters, even or especially when it is hidden from our view. * New Republic *
Helen Scales is one of those rare scientists who can capture the excitement of science. The Brilliant Abyss has a thrill on every page as she explores the deep and little known ocean. But this comes with a warning. Man’s destruction is now reaching the remotest corners of the planet and our survival depends on stopping it. * Mark Kurlansky, author of Cod *
Helen Scales explains why leaving the deep alone is so important – play your part by arming yourself with the facts. * Coast magazine *
Helen Scales’ beautiful account reveals the astonishing complexity and importance of the creatures of the abyss, to the planet and to us. * Callum Roberts, Professor of Marine Conservation and scientific advisor, BBC Blue Planet II *
ISBN: 9781472966889
Dimensions: unknown
Weight: unknown
352 pages