Jelly Bells & Holiday Reads
Look what the marvelous people at Riverhead made! Happy Holidays, everyone!
Jellyfish Farther and Wider
The media that has found something to showcase in SPINELESS has really exceeded anything I could imagine. So here’s the latest, with all my gratitude! Over the weekend, SPINELESS received an amazing review in the Wall Street Journal. I loved all the science packed into this piece, and the placement–above the fold–was …
A Jellyfish Anatomy Primer: By Popular Demand
Since SPINELESS has been out in the world, I’ve discovered one very simple jellyfish thing I never did: draw a jellyfish. Sure, I doodled jellyfish in the edges of my notes and I sketched Picasso-esque outlines of jellyfish on nametags and business cards so people would remember that I was that person …
A Jellyfish Anatomy Primer: By Popular Demand Continue reading
Where You Can Find Spineless & Me
Spineless’s birthday is a week from today! And I’m thrilled that I’ll be able to talk about jellyfish in a bunch of wonderful venues. Here’s a rundown: November 4, 2017 at 1 pm. Texas Book Festival! I’ll be talking with polar scientist Peter Wadhams and geneticist Spencer Wells in the CSPAN/Book TV …
Jellyfish Far and Wide
I’m pinching myself. SPINELESS is out in the world, and it’s been getting some incredible coverage. I’m going to give a rundown here, because each one of these shout-outs about jellyfish and our oceans’ health means so much to me. And what’s more, the variety of places where SPINELESS is showing up …
Our Ocean 2017
Something happened that I didn’t see reported in any news sources that I follow and I think more of us should know about it. On October 5th and 6th, leaders from around the world met for the fourth Our Ocean conference. Started by Secretary John Kerry in 2014, the meeting is like …
SPINELESS!
There’s the cover! And wow, could it be any more beautiful? The stunning colors and elegant layout came from my publisher Riverhead books and the jellyfish drawings are by Ernst Haeckel, an Austrian naturalist/jellyfish expert/philosopher/physician/artist who lived in the late 1800s. If you haven’t ever seen Haeckel’s book of drawings called Kunstformen …
#SciComm!
While I was in the Netherlands earlier this month, the Naturalis Newsroom was gracious enough to feature me in not just one, but two episodes. The first was the subject of last week’s blog and the second was about science communication. That science communication, #scicomm, has become a thing worthy of a …
The Curious Case of the Jellyfish Curator
I’m just back from the Netherlands, where bikes rule the road but canals force all the roads to meander and curve so you are never quite sure where you’re headed. I was lucky enough to have the chance to give a talk about jellyfish at the Naturalis Biodiversity Center, one of the oldest natural history …
Invertebrate Intermission
It’s been a while since I posted here, but that doesn’t mean I haven’t been busy with the jellies. Starting around Christmas, I went through an intense fact-checking/end-noting process with Spineless. I found that I could get through about a five pages a day–and the book is around 300 pages long. It was butt-in-the-chair, back-aching …