Beasts of the Sea
A Novel
Contributors
Formats and Prices
- On Sale
- Nov 18, 2025
- Page Count
- 288 pages
- Publisher
- Little, Brown and Company
- ISBN-13
- 9780316585835
Price
$28.00Price
$37.00 CADFormat
Format:
- Hardcover $28.00 $37.00 CAD
- ebook $13.99 $17.99 CAD
- Audiobook Download (Unabridged) $24.99
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In 1741, thirty-two-year-old naturalist Georg Wilhelm Steller joins Captain Bering’s Great Northern Expedition to scout out a sea route from Asia to America. Plagued with hardships, captain and crew never reach their goal, but they do make a unique discovery, a gentle giant that will be named for the young explorer who described it: Steller’s sea cow.
In 1859, the governor of the Russian territory of Alaska sends his men to seek the skeleton of the massive marine mammal rumored to have vanished a hundred years before, while his sister curates the settlement’s peculiar natural science collection. Two years later, a revered Helsinki professor hires a talented illustrator—a woman!—to make precise drawings of a set of bones sent from afar. The ill-fated beast will help introduce to a skeptical public the concept of human-caused extinction.
Finally, in 1952, the Museum of Zoology assigns its most talented restorer the task of refurbishing the antique skeleton, a testimony to the sea cow’s fate that will fire the imaginations of future generations.
Beasts of the Sea is a breathtaking literary achievement and an adventure that crosses continents and centuries. Told through the stories of the men and women touched by the long-ago discovery of a curious and placid creature, it is a tale of grand human ambition, the quest for knowledge, and the urge to resurrect what humankind has, in its ignorance, destroyed.
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“A wondrous, devastating novel…I challenge anyone to read Beasts of the Sea and not fall in love with—and mourn—the curious creatures it conjures…Reading this magical novel is like peering in awe and terror through the window of a cabinet of curiosities—I will be thinking about it for a long time.”The Bookseller (UK) "Fiction Book of the Month"
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“Almost Shakespearean in its drama and its set-pieces, shifting to and fro in time and space, peopled with vivid characters and their fates…A beautifully written narrative, as deep and profound as the sea itself.”Phillip Hoare, author of William Blake and the Sea Monsters of Love
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“A gorgeous, thought-provoking book about the consequences of the human exploration of the natural world. Its narrative moves through lives and times, with sailors, hunters, naturalists, and artists all playing their part.”Sarah Brooks, author of The Cautious Traveler’s Guide to the Wastelands
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“Mesmerizing. Near to mythic. This profound and moving novel of lost histories and lives held me captured in its spell.”Essie Fox, author of The Fascination
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“A sprawling, seething epic which intertwines the mysteries of the natural world with their destruction when myth and man collide. A delicately woven tale of exploration and exploitation; a sharp cry to protect what is precious in the world before it vanishes.”Lucy Steeds, author of The Artist and the Feast
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