I first heard the author on the Normal Gossip podcast, and was frankly fascinated by someone who would both want to talk about gossip and wax poetically about the sand striker (a marine worm). They must love a good story :)

In all seriousness, Imbler seamlessly weaves personal and sometimes painful anecdotes into her essays about sea animals, which contain so much of her experiences as a queer biracial person. I was struck by her chapter on that experience, where she was asked The Question aka what are you? As she writes, “The Question does not understand me as a person but an object - not who I am but what.”

4.5 stars for raw honesty, vulnerability, and a great premise that nature is perhaps one of our best teachers.