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The Fragile Edge: Diving and Other Adventures in the South Pacific |  | Author: Julia Whitty
Publisher: Mariner Books
Category: Book
List Price: $14.95
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Rating:  9 reviews
Sales Rank: 153967
Media: Paperback
Edition: Reprint
Pages: 304
Number Of Items: 1
Shipping Weight (lbs): 0.7
Dimensions (in): 7.8 x 5.1 x 0.8
ISBN: 054705372X
Dewey Decimal Number: 578.7789099622
EAN: 9780547053721
Publication Date: June 13, 2008
Availability: Usually ships in 1-2 business days
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| • | ISBN13: 9780547053721 | | • | Condition: New | | • | Notes: BUY WITH CONFIDENCE, Over one million books sold! 98% Positive feedback. Compare our books, prices and service to the competition. 100% Satisfaction Guaranteed |
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Product Description
In The Fragile Edge, the documentary filmmaker and deep-sea diver Julia Whitty paints a mesmerizing, scientifically rich portrait of teeming coral reefs and sea life in the South Pacific. She takes us literally beneath the surface of the usual travel narrative, in an underwater equivalent of an African big-game safari. Hammerhead sharks rule a cascading chain of extraordinary creatures, from eagle rays to reef sharks, as the sound of courting humpback whales reverberates through the deep.
Inspiring for both armchair and expert divers, The Fragile Edge reveals how science can extend our understanding of unfathomable waters, opening our eyes to the threats facing coral reefs and explaining why these fragile oases are vital to human survival. In this passionate, spiritual narrative of her adventures in the big blue, Julia Whitty emerges as one of our finest writers on the mystery, beauty, and fragility of the undersea world.
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| Customer Reviews:
Showing reviews 1-5 of 9
Best and most effective overview of the implications of global warming January 11, 2009
Jan Schiller (milwaukee, wi USA)
I truly admire Julia Whitty's writing style and ability to transport me emotively into the world of the South Pacific ocean and to articulate so clearly why we should all be concerned about global warming. I received this book as a gift from someone that knows I scuba dive, and was very happy to dive right in. This is an excellent book. It left me wishing for my next dive trip, much more informed about the South Pacific islands discussed in the book, and concerned, really concerned, about what we've gotten ourselves into by not going green sooner.
The Fragile Edge December 29, 2007
Tim Moses (Bronx, NY United States)
The Fragile Edge by Julia Whitty combines a science journalist's capacity for a precise and illuminating description of undersea flora and fauna encountered in remoter parts of the Polynesian archipelago and a passionate appreciation for its peculiarities and ecological complexities with a philosopher's detachment and bird's eye view of the reefs and the communities that abut them. Your reviewer is a certified divemaster, licensed boat captain and underwater photographer and I read a lot of this stuff. This one is unique in its sensitivity, attention to detail, and the writer's personality that comes through. I've given two copies of the books to other divers in my family.
Joy and Sadness August 15, 2007
Ronald Mayo (Lopez Island, WA USA)
4 out of 5 found this review helpful
I grew up in this world of tropical coral reefs and sharks and tiny bright fish but that was over fifty years ago. Tonight as I sat on the deck of my house overlooking a bay in Washington's temperate Puget Sound, I finished Julia's book and felt those long ago times flood back. And I felt joy and sadness. Joy for the memories of reef sharks suddenly appearing in the Northest pass of the Truk Lagoon; and me swimming free a hundred yards from our skiff. Joy for Moorish Idols escaping into coral forest. Joy for just being there. And sadness, for a world dying before our eyes. People, we've got too many people. When will we figure that out?
But oh my! Can this lady write. Thanks.
Swimming with the Swami June 13, 2007
Karen Laws (Berkeley, CA)
6 out of 6 found this review helpful
"All day we have been observing the surgeonfish..." Julia Whitty begins, and from that first sentence onward, the reader of "The Fragile Edge" is one of the party. Whitty is there with you, chuckling good-naturedly at the antics of an undersea creature or (more likely) of those crazy humans topside. In one of my favorite moments, an account of how the funky old hotel with its peculiar charms has been taken over by new owners whose pampered guests pay $500/night to lounge by the infinity pool is interrupted just at the moment when you think she might succumb to sentimentality or some other curmudgeonly temptation by her confession that, "I like the pool, too." Similarly, Whitty clearly and firmly presents her environmental concerns without, so to speak, wallowing in them. Instead of putting the book aside because you're tired of hearing about how the end of the world is at hand, you're motivated to keep swimming along with a guide whose curiosity and expertise extend to the natural history of molecular plants and animals, as well as the more glamorous sharks and dolphins, from Western science to Eastern metaphysics, and from dissolving atolls and bleached corals to the raw fish marinated in coconut milk served at a Tuvaluan wedding reception. Finally it's her love of the coral reefs she has come to know over many years of diving and study, rather than her fear that global warming will destroy them, that Whitty is most eager to share.
Wondrous, If Vicarious, Adventures In The Deep Thanks To Julia Whitty June 1, 2007
Jill Koenigsdorf (Santa Fe, New Mexico)
6 out of 6 found this review helpful
What a treat to enter the underwater worlds of the South Pacific with documentary filmaker Julia Whitty as your guide! The writing is absolutely gorgeous: "The humphead wrasse who the Tahitians call mara and the French call Napoleon is an imposing fish up to seven feet long and four hundred and twenty pounds, with an overhanging forehead, thick lips, and a blue body overlaid with squiggly patterns of green and yellow that look like the inside of a crcuit board." It is easy enough to get lost in the descriptions of life in the reef, up close and personal, but Whitty doesn't stop there. She brings in philosophy, Darwin, yoga, the history of the people on the islands she decribes, and Buddhism, as she observes life in the reefs, so that the reader feels she is not merely observing what's before her but contemplating it, trying to understand its mysteries. She makes the more humorous sides of this underwater world come alive, all the while getting her message across of the dire straights the worlds coral reefs are currently in. She has a vast knowledge of fish and reef life but makes it accessable, even providing a glossary at the back for the layperson so you come away with new knowledge about worlds you might otherwise never know. I loved this book!!!
Showing reviews 1-5 of 9
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