I have mentioned this book in previous blogs, but never feel I have done it justice. Though I have tried. So now I am wishing I had the writing skills of Dickens/Austen/Tolstoy and lots of other Brilliant Writers all rolled into one so I could find the words to persuade you to buy and read this book:
https://www.amazon.co.uk/Gone-search-remains-extinct-creatures/dp/0711256756
But as I don't I cannot improve on the praise already (and rightly) heaped upon it.
Anyone who has been to Michael's presentations about the natural world - and we have been to many - knows how entertaining, and informative and funny he is.
And here he manages to be entertaining while doing justice to the tragedy that has happened, remembering all the lovely creatures we have lost. He will sweep you along with him in this fascinating memorial to them.
In other words, it is a real page-turner.
The author starts by taking us to the Booth Museum - just down the road from here. He manages to capture the strangeness and fascination of the Booth. It is well worth a visit by the way. And he also skewers the Victorian obsession it commemorates in a couple of sentences:
"Victorian society was enthralled by the natural world and they demonstrated their admiration through coveting, collecting and categorising it. Birds, butterflies, ferns, eggs, seaweeds, shells,you name it - if the Victorians could get their hands on it, they'd kill it, skin it, stuff it, press it and pin it."
Michael takes us all over the world, from Alaska to New Zealand. He describes the valiant, hopeless and heartbreaking struggle of the vanished Stellar's Sea Cows as they tried to protect each other from the slaughter.
And he takes us to Widewater Lagoon, just down the road from us here, where, quietly, with no fanfare, we have recently allowed - or caused - yet another creature to become extinct. It is - or was - the Ivell's Sea Anemone.
It was tiny, but no doubt as important as anything else in the great scheme of things. And if we had been taking care of it, and made things right for it, we would likely have made things right for a lot of other things too.
But we cannot restore the peace of Eden, when all the earthly creation was in perfect harmony. However, I would want everyone to know that our Creator can restore that lost paradise earthwide, and he will.
His promise, recorded 2,000 years ago in the Book of Revelation, and preserved for us to this day, is that he, Jehovah, "will bring to ruin those ruining the earth".
In a minor key, I have to report that John and I came joint fourth in the Fantastic Books Flash Fiction competition. I am extra pleased because Talky Tin, the story that won this fourth place, commemorates our fierce and lovely Saudi cat, Whites. The collection our stories appear in is here:
https://www.amazon.co.uk/dp/B0CFLZSBNS?th=1&psc=1&geniuslink=true
I would love love love you to buy that too - and/or The Umbrellas of Hamelin:
https://www.amazon.co.uk/Umbrellas-Hamelin-Sue-Knight/dp/1914060555
But please buy Michael Blencowe's book first.
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