Join San Juan Island Library for a special presentation by local author Drew Harvell about her latest book, The Ocean's Menagerie: How Earth's Strangest Creatures Reshape the Rules of Life, 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 the size and shape of 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 who garden the coastlines, keeping all the other nearby species in perfect balance. As our planet changes fast, the biomedical, engineering, and energy innovations of these wonderous creatures hold ever more important secrets 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.

Presented in partnership with Griffin Bay Books and Friday Harbor Labs.