Scan barcode
A review by kayeofswords
Why Fish Don't Exist: A Story of Loss, Love, and the Hidden Order of Life by Lulu Miller
dark
emotional
informative
fast-paced
I don't know whether to give it 4 stars because it was well-written or 3 stars to reflect my subjective impression of it, so I'm not rating it. I had to take some time to journal about the author's view that chaos is the ultimate force of the universe (in an atheistic, not Discordian, way) and the toxic things her father said to her when she was young about not mattering (aren't we actually all seeking a place in a community? isn't that what the question is really about? how could something or someone matter if not indexed against a reference point or, perhaps, a <em>telos</em>? maybe that's a bit too philosophical ...). I was also bullied badly in school, and I empathize with the trauma ... that stuff is hard to work through. It's interesting that she fixated on David Starr Jordan as a way to do research therapy to help herself. I added some content warning info in case anyone is curious about what comes up.
That said, I enjoyed learning more about how taxonomy got started and the ways in which it fed into ideological currents, positive and negative, that have persisted to this day. A lot of DSJ's behavior sounds a bit narcissistic ... easy to fly under the radar earlier in his life, explosive and dangerous the more authority he had. I didn't know anything about him before starting to read this book and wasn't expecting that he would veer from taxonomy into eugenics. That was sobering. Really great structural organization to all of this.
The last 45 seconds of the audiobook epilogue was <em>adorable</em> and five-star.
Also, I'm so happy that fish don't exist. I use it as a generic term for aquatic life in some of my non-Earth specfic and now feel like I can do that with impunity.
That said, I enjoyed learning more about how taxonomy got started and the ways in which it fed into ideological currents, positive and negative, that have persisted to this day. A lot of DSJ's behavior sounds a bit narcissistic ... easy to fly under the radar earlier in his life, explosive and dangerous the more authority he had. I didn't know anything about him before starting to read this book and wasn't expecting that he would veer from taxonomy into eugenics. That was sobering. Really great structural organization to all of this.
The last 45 seconds of the audiobook epilogue was <em>adorable</em> and five-star.
Also, I'm so happy that fish don't exist. I use it as a generic term for aquatic life in some of my non-Earth specfic and now feel like I can do that with impunity.
Content Warnings
Graphic: Ableism, Mental illness, Suicidal thoughts, and Suicide attempt
Moderate: Medical trauma
The author describes some heavy stuff, both in history (the eugenics movement, primarily, with all that entails) and in her own life (mental health/suicide).