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A Message from Laguna San Ignacio/Five Year Anniversary by Serge Dedina, Wildcoast March 1, 2005

The Sea Life of Orca Whales

 

Hardcover: 688 pages (9.6" x 6.5" x 1.9") Publisher: Simon & Schuster July 10, 2001 ISBN: 0684866080 Eye of the Whale named by the LA Times among its Best Books of 2001   PRAISE FOR "EYE OF THE WHALE" Dick Russell has done for the gray whale what he did for the striped bass – taught us to love both the fish and the fishermen. In a riveting tale that celebrates the history and culture of the whale fishery, Russell guides us gently to a consciousness of the critical importance of the gray whale's struggle and survival to modern civilization. – Robert F. Kennedy, Jr., President of the Water Keeper Alliance An environmental story with at least the glimmer of a happy ending! Dick Russell's marvelous accounts of the human attempts to decimate and then to protect the great gray whale makes for a wonderful tale – a tale we need to tell over and over and over, so we don't slip back into the bad old habits, so that we extend our compassion and activism toward other less charismatic corners of creation. – Bill McKibben, author of "The End of Nature" A book as grand in its breadth and vision as the scale of its magnificent subject, "Eye of the Whale" is fitting tribute to the trials and tribulations of our troubled truce with one of the world's most moving and magnificent – and instructive – fellow creatures. Listen carefully. Ponder the implications of the compassion that these beings have shown us, and you will grow enriched by the splendor of this sprawling tale. – Carl Safina, author of "Song for the Blue Ocean" If there is an Ishmael for our time, it is Dick Russell. As Ishmael told the story of the sperm whales in the killing time of the great whaling fleets, Russell paints the panorama of gray whales today – from their persecution to their amazing comeback, from their extraordinary migration to their engaging lifeways, from our love affair with whales to the peril we place them in with modern commerce. Dick Russell is our Ishmael all right, and Captain Scammon is his Ahab, in a magnificent yarn of human and natural history that Melville himself would read with gusto and praise to the skies like a whale's high blow. Look into this big bright eye, and prepare to be struck to the heart. – Robert Michael Pyle, author of "Chasing Monarchs" The story of humanity's involvement with gray whales is long and extraordinarily intricate. Russell has researched his subject well and is a grand storyteller. He enriches his text with information that is new even to those of us who work with whales daily. Although I lacked the time to read it all, I dipped into Russell's book many times and kept coming upon rich and rewarding accounts of events about which I knew little. It's an excellent read... get it. – Roger Payne, author of "Among Whales" Anyone who's been held rapt in a whale's presence will find this a delight – and those who haven't will find it an inspiration. – Kirkus Reviews, starred review May 1, 2001. paperback: 688 pages / Island Press - Shearwater Books (2004)

 

Eye of the Whale Sample Chapters Prologue Chapter 1 Chapter 2 Chapter 9 Chapter 10 Epilogue

 

Gray Whale Trip Photos Laguna San Ignacio Mother and calf approach skiffs First Contact Max (author's nephew) and whale Mother and Calf Calf pokes his snout up Petting the calf Looking into the eye of the whale Mother says goodbye

 

Reviews San Diego Union Tribune - 7/15/01 Los Angeles Times - 8/5/01 Washington Post - 8/5/01 Toronto Globe & Mail - 8/11/01 Newsday - 8/12/01 New York Times - 8/12/01 Milwaukee Journal Sentinel - 8/12/01 St. Louis Post-Dispatch - 8/19/01 Baltimore Sun - 8/19/01 Providence Journal - 9/2/01 New Yorker - 9/2/01 Scientific American - 1/2/02 Literate Nature - 10/27/12

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