Where the Seals Sing - Susan Richardson - 2022



By: Susan Richardson
Narrated by: Di Langford
Length: 12 hrs and 59 mins
Unabridged Audiobook
Release date: 07-07-22
Categories: Science & Engineering, Ecosystems & Habitats, Animals
Language: English
Publisher: William Collins
Format: mp3 64/48 stereo



There are fewer grey seals in the world than endangered African elephants, but the British Isles host almost half of this global population. Every year these charismatic animals, with their expressive eyes and whiskers more sensitive than our fingertips, haul out on our shores to breed and raise their pups.

Susan Richardson has always been entranced by seals; they seem to have surfaced at key junctions throughout her life, comforting her as an anxious child, bringing joy as she began to spread her wings as a writer and helping her to find her way after the loss of her mother. Now she sets out to trace the rhythm of their lives, travelling the coasts clockwise from Cornwall to Norfolk, in line with the autumn pupping season. Along the way she explores the myths surrounding seals, from their shapeshifting selkie skins to the claims that they decimate fish populations, and she discovers that the greatest dangers they face come from co-existing with us.

Brimming with vivid descriptions of the natural world, Where the Seals Sing is a lyrical tale of memory, rescue and rehabilitation. While loss, both personal and ecological, is a recurring theme, the human–seal connection that flows through the story is stirring and uplifting.

©2022 Susan Richardson (P)2022 HarperCollins Publishers Limited

Critic Reviews

"Susan Richardson's work is a suspended state, caught between the us we presume to be and the species with which we share this watery, fragile planet. Cut and precise, archaic and innovative, transcendent and in-the-moment.... This beautifully written compendium summons up the sea we always thought it to be, but which now hovers in the balance." (Philip Hoare, author of Leviathan)

"[Richardson] writes in prehensile language, capable of grasping something vast, ancient, chthonic: the Earth in must." (Jay Griffiths, author of Wild)

"[Richardson] shows how art and writing can furnish both beautiful and challenging reflections on our relationship with animals.... Precise and playful; rhapsodic and rebellious." (Andy Brown)





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