A Sea Full of Turtles: The Search for Optimism in an Epoch of Extinction

(Hardback)

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An inspired and impassioned story of adventure that explores the richness of marine life and charts a path of resillience and hope.

Everyone alive today is witnessing a mass extinction event caused by the more than eight billion humans who share this planet. At times, it seems there is little hope. Climate change, resource exploitation, agrochemicals, overfishing, plastics, dead zones in our oceans, drought and desertification, conversion of habitat to housing, farming, and industrial infrastructurethe list of impacts and insults goes on and on. We are, it seems, on an unalterable path that will continue to decimate biodiversity.

A feeling of hopelessness, while not unwarranted, is part of the problem. Without hope, without some belief in the possibility of positive outcomes, the fight for nature is over. Why even try if the battle is already lost

While staring the problems squarely in the face, A Sea Full of Turtles offers hope for those who care about our living world. Delivered as a travel narrative set in Mexicos Gulf of California (Sea of Cortez), at one level the book focuses on dramatically underfunded but highly successful efforts to protect sea turtles. But the book goes beyond Mexico and beyond sea turtles to look at how some humans have changed their relationship with natureand how that change can one day end the extinction crisis.

Enchanting, galvanizing, and brimming with joy and wonder, A Sea Full of Turtles will inspire immediate action to face the great challenges that lie ahead. Pessimism is the lazy way out. Optimism, it turns out, is both a reasonable and an essential attitude for us all as we fight for the beautiful diversity of life on our Earth.

Reviews

In this lovingly-crafted book, Bill Streever both builds a case for optimism for the future and takes us on a grand adventure in the boat wake of Steinbeck and Ricketts. As much about the animals as our own decisions,Sea Full ofTurtlesis a rare kind of honest reflection that shows us what survival can look like when we start to pay attention. * Juli Berwald, author ofSpinelessandLife on the Rocks *
If you care about the plight of seaturtlesand other marine lifeand we all ought toyou will be moved by this heartfelt, intimate account. With a curious eye and a gift for prose, biologist Bill Streever weaves together strands of biology, history, and anthropology in a way that only one who spends large portions of his life on and in the ocean can do. * Jonathan Balcombe, author of What a Fish Knows and Super Fly *
With humor, intelligence, and an infectious sense of wonder, Bill Streever'sSea Full ofTurtlesfosters not only appreciation for the animals in itstitle but a fascination with the larger topic of extinction and how it might be averted. Far from being a downer about a beleaguered species, this travel and science adventure set on the hot sandy beaches of Mexico's Gulf of California is an accessible and entertaining read that admirably avoids either excess gloom or unearned optimism. Nearly a century after John Steinbeck looked for philosophical insights in Mexican tidepools, Streever has given us a new reason to find delight and tentative hope along ever-changing shorelines. * Andromeda Romano-Lax, author of Searching for Steinbeck'sSea of Cortez: A Makeshift Expedition Along Baja's Desert Coast *

Author Bio

Bill Streeveris the bestselling and award-winning author ofAnd Soon I Heard a Roaring Wind,Cold (aNew York Timesnotable book), andHeat. As a biologist, he has worked on issues ranging from climate change to the restoration of Arctic tundra to underwater noise to the evolution of cave crayfish. With his wife and co-captain, he splits his time between Alaska and their cruising sailboat, currently in Central America.