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A review by thecrookedspine
The Brilliant Abyss by Helen Scales
adventurous
challenging
dark
hopeful
informative
inspiring
reflective
tense
slow-paced
5.0
This book should be required reading for the human race. I’m not saying it’s the perfect book, but the information Helen Scales conveys and the clarity with which she conveys it are invaluable, necessary, and exigent.
The first half of the book introduces us to an incredible cast of unique characters that exist in the deepest, darkest reaches of the ocean, living strange and hidden lives. Learning about them was extremely interesting and it was clear through her writing that Helen Scales has a lot of passion and love for these beings. For my part, I feel that visually seeing them was important to fully engaging though, so I highly recommend the documentaries that can be found free on YouTube by a channel called Natural World Facts, which focuses heavily on the deep sea and does a wonderful job. Their footage is astonishing and they’re incredibly informative pieces. Here’s a link to a documentary they did on chemosynthetic oases: https://youtu.be/1LrcTa0dDmw?si=45bNvazdpKCO1Q5H
The second half though is where this book really becomes mandatory reading. Scales begins to go over some of the struggles the oceans and our new friends from the first half of the book are facing as the planet faces more and more human impact, and crucially she speaks of things which have yet to happen but which are being planned, perhaps most notably (though not exclusively) deep sea mining. If you’ve not heard of this Last Week Tonight with John Oliver recently did an episode on this, which it seems to me they took directly from reading this book, so if you want to get a brief synopsis of this issue you can also find that here: https://youtu.be/qW7CGTK-1vA?si=E05-vKmGfRiF9oE
There are some reviews for this book here on Goodreads which I’ve seen that are extremely reductive, claiming that Scales is saying we only harm the ocean, that we should stop interacting with it in any way, stop fishing, stop investigating, stop everything all at once, right now. I want to be clear that in no way does she advocate for any such thing in this book. This is an extremely reasonable, science-lead woman who wants to preserve the oceans for the sake of every being on the planet, including people, and wants to make use of it for people, too. She advocates for using the deep sea as a source for new medicines, and she advocates for responsible fishing, and continued scientific research. I think above all else she advocates for relationship to the sea, looking beneath the surface to see the impact we make beneath the waves and recognizing the fellowship of the life it holds. And that is something that would enrich us all, make us stronger in the fight against climate change, and make our world 75% bigger and bluer.
I highly recommend this book. No, it’s not perfect, but that’s not the point.
The first half of the book introduces us to an incredible cast of unique characters that exist in the deepest, darkest reaches of the ocean, living strange and hidden lives. Learning about them was extremely interesting and it was clear through her writing that Helen Scales has a lot of passion and love for these beings. For my part, I feel that visually seeing them was important to fully engaging though, so I highly recommend the documentaries that can be found free on YouTube by a channel called Natural World Facts, which focuses heavily on the deep sea and does a wonderful job. Their footage is astonishing and they’re incredibly informative pieces. Here’s a link to a documentary they did on chemosynthetic oases: https://youtu.be/1LrcTa0dDmw?si=45bNvazdpKCO1Q5H
The second half though is where this book really becomes mandatory reading. Scales begins to go over some of the struggles the oceans and our new friends from the first half of the book are facing as the planet faces more and more human impact, and crucially she speaks of things which have yet to happen but which are being planned, perhaps most notably (though not exclusively) deep sea mining. If you’ve not heard of this Last Week Tonight with John Oliver recently did an episode on this, which it seems to me they took directly from reading this book, so if you want to get a brief synopsis of this issue you can also find that here: https://youtu.be/qW7CGTK-1vA?si=E05-vKmGfRiF9oE
There are some reviews for this book here on Goodreads which I’ve seen that are extremely reductive, claiming that Scales is saying we only harm the ocean, that we should stop interacting with it in any way, stop fishing, stop investigating, stop everything all at once, right now. I want to be clear that in no way does she advocate for any such thing in this book. This is an extremely reasonable, science-lead woman who wants to preserve the oceans for the sake of every being on the planet, including people, and wants to make use of it for people, too. She advocates for using the deep sea as a source for new medicines, and she advocates for responsible fishing, and continued scientific research. I think above all else she advocates for relationship to the sea, looking beneath the surface to see the impact we make beneath the waves and recognizing the fellowship of the life it holds. And that is something that would enrich us all, make us stronger in the fight against climate change, and make our world 75% bigger and bluer.
I highly recommend this book. No, it’s not perfect, but that’s not the point.