The Brilliant Abyss cover art

The Brilliant Abyss

True Tales of Exploring the Deep Sea, Discovering Hidden Life and Selling the Seabed

 Preview

Get 30 days of Standard free

£5.99/mo after trial. Cancel monthly.
Try for £0.00
More purchase options

The Brilliant Abyss

By: Helen Scales
Narrated by: Helen Scales
Try for £0.00

£5.99 a month after 30 days. Cancel anytime.

Buy Now for £13.27

Buy Now for £13.27

Season's Savings | £0.99/mo for 3 months

£5.99/mo after 3 months - terms apply. Cancel monthly
Bloomsbury presents The Brilliant Abyss written and read by Helen Scales.

The deep sea is the last, vast wilderness on the planet. This is the story of our relationship with it – how we imagine, explore and exploit it.

For centuries, myth-makers and storytellers have concocted imaginary monsters of the deep, and now scientists are looking there to find bizarre, unknown species, chemicals to make new medicines, and to gain a greater understanding of how this world of ours works. With an average depth of 12,000 feet and chasms that plunge much deeper, it forms a frontier for new discoveries.

The Brilliant Abyss tells the story of our relationship with the deep sea – how we imagine, explore and exploit it. It captures the golden age of discovery we are currently in and looks back at the history of how we got here, while also looking forward to the unfolding new environmental disasters that are taking place miles beneath the waves, far beyond the public gaze.

Throughout history, there have been two distinct groups of deep-sea explorers. Both have sought knowledge but with different and often conflicting ambitions in mind. Some people want to quench their curiosity; many more have been lured by the possibilities of commerce and profit. The tension between these two opposing sides is the theme that runs throughout the book, while readers are taken on a chronological journey through humanity’s developing relationship with the deep sea. The Brilliant Abyss ends by looking forwards to humanity’s advancing impacts on the deep, including mining and pollution and what we can do about them.©2021 Helen Scales (P)2021 Bloomsbury Publishing PLC Biological Sciences Biology Earth Sciences Ecosystems & Habitats Environment Nature & Ecology Outdoors & Nature Science Conservation Thought-Provoking Mining
adbl_web_anon_alc_button_suppression_t1

Critic reviews

Scales’s approach is […] enthralling and richly expressed and highlights how closely our lives depend on the deep.”
It is hard to imagine a more timely or important book than The Brilliant Abyss.
Marine biologist Helen Scales’s The Brilliant Abyss is a literary bathysphere enabling us to explore this final frontier from the comfort of dry land, and a passionate plea for us to preserve ocean biodiversity, even if just for our own good.
Helen Scales is one of those rare scientists who can capture the excitement of science. The Brilliant Abyss has a thrill on every page as she explores the deep and little known ocean. But this comes with a warning. Man’s destruction is now reaching the remotest corners of the planet and our survival depends on stopping it.
The Brilliant Abyss, Helen Scales’s sweeping survey of the seafloor, is brave enough to risk a darker and, in some ways, more satisfying tone … Scales’s great gift is for transmuting our awe at the wonders of the deep sea into a kind of quiet rage that they could soon be no more.
Written by a highly articulate expert in the field, The Brilliant Abyss is so comprehensive and insightful that it will be a long time before it’s surpassed … In the first half of her book, Scales does an excellent job of animating the almost unbelievable panoply of life in the deep. As an explorer herself, she has seen things first-hand that few others will ever witness. But it is the second part of her book, devoted to the human impacts on the abyss, which brought gasps to my throat … It is hard to imagine a more timely or important book than The Brilliant Abyss. Carefully conceived and luminously written, it is certain to be a bestseller, which gives me hope that its urgent message might help save the world.
Fascinating … The Brilliant Abyss is a manifesto for change as much as it is a description of an ecological crisis. Its overall effect is not to clarify the waters … but to insist that what’s already down there matters, even or especially when it is hidden from our view.
All stars
Most relevant
An incredible insight into the life and environment down in the depths. Full of fascinating behind the scenes stories, and would facts about the surreal creatures from the abyss. However, if you are already suffering from climate panic, it may be best to bite out before the final chapter. Harrowing stuff.

Fascinating

Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.
Really interesting topic which I had a level of curiosity prior. The author delivers this very well in an immersive way and hits home with some important truths on how we must protect our oceans and wildlife.

Interesting topic delivered very well

Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.
Narrator shared her enthusiasm for her subject. There was much food for thought. I hope many people will read this book.

The best book I have read for some time.

Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.
I was fascinated by this book and learned so much more about the deep sea.
It seems such a vast and virtually Unknown area of our planet, yet one which helps stabilise our’ blue planet’.
I was shocked to hear of the damage that certain types of fishing can do and outraged to hear of plans for deep sea mining which could irreparably damage species and their habitat and ultimately life in dry land too.
It is so entertaining so well read by the author, and so full of interesting information that I am definitely going to read it again in a couple of months.

Vivid visual description

Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.
Well presented and engaging collection of themed essays on the deep oceans and their ecology.
Sharp and direct points on human exploitation and short sightedness and the need for urgent change.
My only criticism - and this could be applied to almost every similar work - is that it fails to acknowledge or discuss the most difficult issue of catastrophic human-induced environmental change, namely that the human population has reached unsustainably high levels.

Excellent book - thoughtful and delightfully read by the author

Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.
See more reviews