THE SOUND OF THE SEA: SEASHELLS AND THE FATE OF THE OCEANS BY CYNTHIA BARNET

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AScience FridayBest Science Book of the Year
AKirkus ReviewsBest Nonfiction Book of the Year
ALibrary JournalBest Science and Technology Book of the Year
ATampa Bay TimesBest Book of the Year

A stunning history of seashells and the animals that make them that “will have you marveling at natureBarnetts account remarkably spirals out, appropriately, to become a much larger story about the sea, about global history and about environmental crises and preservation” (John Williams,New York Times Book Review).

Seashells have been the most coveted and collected of natures creations since the dawn of humanity. They were money before coins, jewelry before gems, art before canvas.

InThe Sound of the Sea, acclaimed environmental author Cynthia Barnett blends cultural history and science to trace our long love affair with seashells and the hidden lives of the mollusks that make them. Spiraling out from the great cities of shell that once rose in North America to the warming waters of the Maldives and the slave castles of Ghana, Barnett has created an unforgettable history of our world through an examination of the unassuming seashell. She begins with their childhood wonder, unwinds surprising histories like the origin of Shell Oil as a family business importing exotic shells, and charts what shells and the soft animals that build them are telling scientists about our warming, acidifying seas.

From the eerie calls of early shell trumpets to the evolutionary miracle of spines and spires and the modern science of carbon capture inspired by shell, Barnett circles to her central point of listening to natures wisdomand acting on what seashells have to say about taking care of each other and our world.

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