Saving the Seas in Future Sea | Book Review

【 FUTURE SEA 】

An incredibly enlightening and captivating piece of non-fiction to open your eyes.

Genre: Non-fiction
Author: Deborah Rowan Wright
Published: October 2020
Publisher: University of Chicago Press
Pages: 200 (hardback)

I loved every second in this book, which feels like a huge achievement for non-fiction for someone who is predominantly a fiction reader. I’ve been wanting to read more about climate change from the experts themselves and this is book one in the progress of that journey.

I picked up Future Sea after poring over the University of Chicago Press’s catalogue of environmental science books and making a list, then going to the bookstore and picking up the titles that they had in stock. This being one of them.

I’ve never explored this topic in more depth than the odd article or David Attenborough documentary, so I took away so much from this and feel like I expanded some areas of my knowledge. I didn’t find it hard to read, it was quite easy and filled with just enough personal stories from the author written in a more narrative-style to keep the pacing of the book balanced.

Things I learnt from this:

We need to protect the whole ocean to make a difference, not just small areas.
Some types of sunscreen are causing a toxic environment for coral when it runs off our skin into the ocean, causing bleaching.
The true extent of the toxicity of salmon farming (over population within nets, increased disease spreading, high volume of intense antibiotics, intentional dyeing of salmon flesh with canthaxanthin).
What ghost fishing is (damage done by discarded fishing nets etc, killing multitudes of sea animals).
The great example New Zealand leads in protecting seas and the positive bounce-back of sea life from this action (look up Goat Island Reserve).
The importance of equal status for women as more opportunities for women naturally slows down human population growth as they can choose not to have more children than they want.
That 88% of people who watched David Attenborough’s Blue Planet II episode about the effect of discarded plastic adjusted to single-use plastics.

Actions I took from this:
I have started a regular donation to the Olive Ridley Project (http://oliveridleyproject.org/)

This book thoroughly inspired me (and I’m not saying you ~have~ to start donating too, I just wanted to show how much it touched me) and it’s really encouraged me to pick up more books like this and to continue learning.

Grab a copy!