The Sea Inside

Starred review from March 3, 2014
Hoare (The Whale: In Search of the Giants of the Sea) takes readers on a leisurely and lyrical tour of the world's waters and their inhabitants. A regular visitor to the sea near his home in England, Hoare shares his love and fascination for nature of all kinds, from the Eurasian oystercatcher and seals to the vestigial structures humans possess that provide evidence of ancestry. Hoare's writing reads like a postcard or journal demarcating his travels. On the Isle of Wight, he discusses ravens and the life of pilgrims. He encounters sperm whales around the Azores, sharing how they hear sound and make vibrations, and blue whales in the Indian Ocean, contemplating how near they came to extinction due to hunting. A journey to Tasmania reminds Hoare of his ancestors who landed there and brings to mind the haunting tale of the Tasmanian tiger, possibly hunted to extinction decades ago but with rumored sightings in recent years. Hoare swims with dolphins, observes a porpoise autopsy, and visits the island of Kapiti, an avian reserve. Hoare's writing awakens the senses with visions, sounds, and smells of the ocean; his delight and interest in nature will encourage readers to look around with new eyes. Agent: Gillon Aitken, Aitken Alexander Associates.

February 1, 2014
Do we come from the sea? Hoare's (The Whale: In Search of the Giants of the Sea, 2010, etc.) absorbing book may well lead you to think so. Could not man have come from the sea in search of the bounty of tidal beaches? Anyone who has an affinity, indeed a need, for the water will understand the author's desire to swim every day near his home in Southampton, England, where "it is never not beautiful." "At low tide," he writes, "the beach is an indecent expanse laid bare by retreat, more like farmland than anything of the sea: an inundated field, almost peaty with sediment, as much charcoal as it is sludge." No matter what country or continent he visits, the author makes a point to swim and become a part of that sea. He's fearless as he leaps into oceans near and far to commune with any swimming mammal that may be near; whether whales or a superpod of 200 dolphins, the mammals of the sea circle him, inspect him and accept him. His travels and his meandering, humorous writing take us from the Isle of Wight to the Azores, Sri Lanka, and the nearly primeval Tasmania and New Zealand, and Hoare delivers delightful descriptions of sea creatures and shore birds, bemoaning animals newly and nearly extinct. This is not a book following the geography of the sea; nor is it a history of sailing. It is an attempt to establish and examine the oneness that the Maori have understood for years: There is no difference between life on land and life in the sea. While the author may digress occasionally, readers will relish his writing and devotion to nature and likely won't begrudge him a bit of family history here and there. A beautifully written memoir/travelogue with readable diversions into philosophy.

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Starred review from March 15, 2014
As Hoare (The Whale, 2010) states in the opening pages of this lyrical book, the sea defines us, connects us, and separates us. When Hoare sets out on a journey to rediscover the sea, he also meditates on the past, on the whales, birds, and other animals he encounters and on the people who had been there before him. Starting out in Southampton Water, his own suburban sea, he radiates out to the Isle of Wight (his white sea) and London with its underground rivers (the inland sea), never out of reach of the tidal surge. From there he travels to the Azores (the azure sea), where he dives with dolphins and sperm whales, then to Sri Lanka (the sea of serendipity) and an encounter with the sleek sensuality of the world's largest animal, the blue whale. Tasmania (the southern sea) brings more whaleshumpbacks this timeand seabirds and the mythic Tasmanian tiger, while New Zealand (the wandering sea) offers encounters with an enormous bull sperm whale, and tiny Kapiti (the silent sea) presents a paean to the Maori. Literary history and natural history entwine so seamlessly in Hoare's narrative that the barrier between readers and the sea within all of us blurs and disappears.(Reprinted with permission of Booklist, copyright 2014, American Library Association.)