The Ocean's Menagerie

How Earth's Strangest Creatures Reshape the Rules of Life

De: Drew Harvell

Narrado por: Andi Arndt

An elegantly written exploration of the cutting edge science of the strangest and most remarkable creatures on our planet by a leading marine biologist

Hundred-year-old giant clams, coral kingdoms that rival human cities, and jellyfish that glow in the dark: ocean invertebrates are among the oldest and most diverse organisms on earth, seeming to bend the “rules” of land-based biology. Although sometimes unseen in the deep, the spineless creatures contain 600 million years of adaptation to problems of disease, energy consumption, nutrition, and defense.

In The Ocean’s Menagerie, world-renowned marine ecologist Dr. Drew Harvell takes us diving from Hawaii to the Salish Sea, from St. Croix to Indonesia, to uncover the incredible underwater “superpowers” of spineless creatures: we meet corals many times stronger than steel or concrete, sponges who create potent chemical compounds to fight off disease, and sea stars that garden the coastlines, keeping all the other nearby species in balance. As our planet changes fast, the biomedical, engineering, and energy innovations of these wonderous creatures inspire ever more important solutions to our own survival.

The Ocean’s Menagerie is a tale of biological marvels, a story of a woman’s passionate connection to an adventurous career in science, and a call to arms to protect the world’s most ancient ecosystems.

©2025 Drew Harvell (P)2025 Penguin Audio

Reseñas de la Crítica

"A love letter to the ocean, and its weird and wonderful creatures, from an eminent explorer and marine biologist. Each page is full of wonder and surprise, and in every tale of a shape-shifting octopus or luminous jellyfish, we are reminded why the ocean is worth conserving.”—Steve Brusatte, New York Times bestselling author of The Rise and Fall of the Dinosaurs

“Ocean invertebrates have billions of years of experience living, changing and proliferating into an astonishing array of shapes, sizes, and ways of living. They’re more diversely weirder—and more mysterious—than big, bony, familiar animals. Drew Harvell has explored, thought deeply about, and actually lived in the ocean. The ocean’s life is woven into her own. She is deeply in love with her amazing subjects; a few pages into this warm and wondrous book, you will be too.”—Carl Safina, bestselling author of Beyond Words

“Everyone lives on Planet Ocean, but not everyone has a front row seat to see what makes it so wonderful. Drew Harvell is the teacher you want to reveal the intricate mysteries that make up most life in the sea. The Ocean’s Menagerie has unforgettable lessons that mix science, wonder, and a deep love for life beneath the water’s edge.”—Nick Pyenson, author of Spying on Whales