Sabrina Imbler

This is SUCH a tiny book. But it does an impossible amount in that little space. I love the poeticness of it, the geology of it, the queerness of it, the memoir of it, the personification of volcanoes of it. But most of all I love how those forms blend into each other, as if they were rolled over by tectonic plates, warmed into magma, and metomorphosed into something new.

Sabrina Imbler is a queer, mixed-race science writer who does not come from a traditional science background. In this memoir, they compare their life experiences - being queer, realizing they’re trans, being part Asian, moving from California to New York City, etc. - with the weird lives of sea creatures from feral goldfish to maternal octopuses to communal salps.

I think I would call this more “essays” than a memoir, because there isn’t really a throughline or chronology. It’s show more just their feelings about bits and pieces of their life. Which is fine! I have read other books that try to make the same connections between other living creatures and the author's life, and this is far better than most. Imbler does extensive research and the connections are made on a paragraph-by-paragraph basis, not just chapter-by-chapter. I am a big fan of Imbler’s science writing on the internet and this is more of the same. My only quibble is that I wish there had been more of it…both more memoir and more about the animals. show less

I loved Dyke [geology] so much that I wasn't sure that this one would quite hold up, but it's possible that I loved this one even more. A collection of essays that is part memoir, part marine biology, it compares brooding octopus moms starving to death to eating disorders, sturgeons spawning up rivers to ancestors boating upriver in China to flee the Japanese. I loved all of these, but my favorite essay examined both salps (a clear, gelatinous creature that lives part of its life in solitary show more phase, another as a chain of clones of tens to hundreds of individuals, and sometimes erupts into booms that can cover THOUSANDS OF SQUARE MILES of ocean surface) to the Dyke March and queer gathering spaces. It may sounds like a strange structure for a book, but it was superb. show less

Memoirs are usually not to my taste, but the way this one interspersed facts about sea creatures with personal stories somehow made it interesting to me. I feel like I learned a lot about marine animals. The connections the author drew to their own life are also masterfully chosen, and executed well. I particularly like the chapter that drew connections between yeti crabs at transient undersea vents and queers finding community in fleeting underground dance parties. Definitely one to check show more out. The audiobook is narrated by the author, who does a good job. I like the added authenticity from this, and the way they laugh at the parts we're supposed to find funny. show less