Grounded in the author's experiences in Antarctica, Wales, and Indonesia, this book is a call to action to protect our oceans and leverage their unique power to save our planet.
Author Emily Cunningham grapples with the beauty and horror she has encountered around the world as a marine biologist. As a scientist her prose is precise, and as a young person her voice is passionate, timely, and inspiring, particularly when she describes her home beaches in Wales.
Our Ocean to Save takes the reader from "Ocean Emergency," meant to educate us about the threats, large and small, facing the oceans, to "Ocean of Hope," and "Ocean of Possibility" showing us why it matters to resist doomerism and what the future could look like if we acted. Cunningham describes possible futures to us, based both on the best available evidence-based predictions, and speculative prose as she imagines returning to previously damaged landscapes as an adult and a grandmother.
The book also hands readers the tools and information needed to take action to protect the ocean, clearly outlining whose responsibility it is to do what. This is both an optimistic and a realistic book, reminding readers that we cannot "get back" what we have lost, but that there is still much to save.
Throughout, Cunninham's advice is practical, grounded in her own experiences as a marine biologist, and intended to sustain the longevity of readers' action-responses. After reading Our Ocean to Save, you won't doubt that we all hold the keys to making a difference in the ocean's future. Emily Cunningham is a marine biologist, and an award-winning ocean conservationist from the UK. She has worked in Europe, Asia, the Americas, and Antarctica. She was named a global 30 under 30 environmental leader by the North American Association for Environmental Education. She serves on the Board of the UK's leading marine conservation organization where she focuses on making conservation work more inclusive, inviting in voices which are typically left out of the conversation. She's been named a national Rising Star and won a UK Women of the Future Award. She recently gave a joint address with the UN Special Envoy for the Ocean. In addition to her conservation work, she has extensive experience as a marine researcher.
