In his new book($28, Little, Brown and Company), journalistBill Streever says that he has an agenda, right off the bat. He wants to tempt people to go diving, to think differently about what might be happening under the water’s surface. “I wanted readers to embrace the part of our world that is shrouded by depth,” he writes.
The book is broadly about the science and history of underwater exploration, from 17th-century submarines to today’s freedivers. But Streever, who is alsoan obsessive diver andlives on a boat, drills down to the human scale, too. He starts with a gripping story of the 1960s exploration of the Marianas Trenchand the fear and anxietydivers and scientists felt when they tried to get to the deepest point on the planet. He explains the ways we’ve figured out how to managewater and air over time—the hows of deep-sea diving—but it’s also about the whysand what drives people to push themselves fartherunder water.
Streever,and his history as a diver, is very much a part of the story, and he’s fascinated by the quirks and evolutionof the sport: how freedivers trainand what Aristotle thought about early diving bells. But he’s also thinking about the futureand how both science and love for a place can contribute to protecting the struggling ocean. He ends the book with renowned marine biologist Sylvia Earleand her plea for divers, or anyone who cares about the water, to do something about it.
Streever’s is one of two new books that lookat how recreationcan translate to a deeper relationship with the sea. ($27, Penguin Random House), a memoir about fishing on Martha’s Vineyard from competitive surfcaster, fishing guide, and fish taxidermist Janet Messineo, also describes an obsessionwith unknown vastness, whether stalking striped bass or mapping the ocean floor, is the most interesting part of both books.
Messineo takes a slightly different tack to show how she developed her relationship with the ocean. While finding purpose through time spent outside isn’t a new premise for a book, her in-depthlook into the macho world of surfcasting, and how she became a part of it in the seventies, is novel. She was one of the first women fishing for stripers and other big fishon the Atlantic coast, but her path there was winding and unexpected, starting with a tough, mill-town childhood.Atrip to California chasing LSD dealers with a bad-news ex-husband eventually brought her to the Vineyard. She shares the lifetime of early mornings it took to learn the subtleties of surfcasting,the flashes of luck involved inlanding a monster fish, and how she nearly drownedin leaky waders and wasdragged offshore by strong catches.
Casting into the Light occasionally gets bogged down in the details, but it’s a glimpse into theobsessive world of surfcasting,chasing huge striped bass, and the low-key past of a now-fancy island. The best parts are when Messineogets into the tight, wild fishing community living on the margins of a resort town. The taxidermy tidbits don’t hurt either, like asking her neighbor to fell a pigeon with a slingshot for her to practice on, and mountingfish for Spike Lee.
The two books are thoughtful in different ways. Streever pulls together stories that showhis evolving appreciation for the sea, to demonstratehow important and misunderstood the ocean is. Messineo twists the kaleidoscope of her own life on the shore to give a long-range view of her love for the sport and the fish and the sea. “Come April, the first time I get my fishing rod out of it’s winter storage and stand in surf up to my thing to cast, I exhale. I feel as though I’ve been holding my breath for the last five months,” she writes. They’re both about trying to understand the ocean, but they both acknowledge the catch: that we never really can.
Two More New Ocean-Oriented Books
“Wild Sea: A History of the Southern Ocean,”by Joy McCann
Australian environmental-historian McCann gives a of the Antarctic Ocean, the world’s least-known body of water. It’s full of polar-explorer stories and current environmental risks, and it’s nice to feel like there are parts of the world that still hold mystery.
“Eat Like a Fish: My ϳԹs as a Fisherman Turned Restorative Ocean Farmer,”by Bren Smith
The ocean holds a ton of potential for sustainable agriculture, and Smith, who runs what he calls one of the first sustainable , makes a for it. He tells the story of how aquaculture pulled him away from the adrenaline of commercial fishingand the role he thinks it can play in the future.