Blue Machine: How the Ocean Shapes Our World

Product Information

Czerski is a wonderful writer…. a compelling and elegantly written story…. [The] Blue Machine really does change the way you see the world.—Christopher Hart, Daily Mail Helen Czerski's absorbing Storm in a Teacup stands head and shoulders above other popular science books. Irish TImes In Helen Czerski's hands, the mechanical becomes magical. An instant classic. Tristan Gooley, author of How to Read Water This is a fascinating book about the ocean and how it shapes our world, how it impacts our lives and how it helps us today. The author does include science in this book, but it is explained in a way that is completely understandable to a non-science-brained person. Awash with fascinating facts. Helen Czerski writes with authority, passion and an easy conversational style . You will want to be out there on the ice and ocean with her. I loved it. Hugh Aldersey-Williams, author of Tide

One thing is clear, this woman loves the ocean and anything and everything associated with it. The book is less of a novel than it is an outpouring of a life's research encompassing everything from the water cycle, to a history of trade routes, whale excrement, ocean food webs, the life of scientists working at the poles, deep ocean biology, plastic contamination, whale earwax, the transition from sailing to the steam-engine, and yes, more whale poop. It was very interesting, yet was also all over the place. A fascinating dive into the essential engine that drives our world. Czerski brings the oceans alive with compelling stories that masterfully navigate this most complex system.—Gaia Vince, author of Nomad Century: How Climate Migration Will Reshape Our World Timely, elegant and passionately argued, The Blue Machine is one of the biggest stories ever told. The understanding it offers is crucial to our future. Drawing on years of experience at the forefront of marine science, Helen Czerski captures the magnitude and subtlety of this complex force, showing us the thrilling extent to which we are at the mercy of this great engine.All of the Earth's ocean, from the equator to the poles, is a single-engine powered by sunlight – a blue machine. This is a book about the blue machine that drives our planet. We are taken on an intimate tour of the sea, it's layers, it's inhabitants from the smallest to the biggest, and how it effects our lives. I learned that salt - no matter how exotic it appears or where it comes from - is in fact all the same.

The author was mentored by Hawaiian wisdom keeper Kimokeo Kapahulehua who said in another place: "Call nā po‘e ka lani, nā po‘e moana, nā po‘e ka hōnua -- the people of the heavens, the people of the ocean, and the people of the land, we're all just one big family in how we work together in preserving everything." I wonder what he thinks of the machine metaphor and that would have made a much better book. A fascinating dive into the essential engine that drives our world. Czerski brings the oceans alive with compelling stories that masterfully navigate this most complex system.' The blue of Earth is a gigantic engine, a dynamic liquid powerhouse that stretches around our planet and is connected to every part of our lives. It has components on every scale, from the mighty Gulf Stream gliding across the Atlantic to the tiny bubbles bursting at the top of a breaking wave. This is a beautiful, elegant, tightly woven system, full of surprising connections and profound consequences. All of our fresh water is borrowed from the ocean – every cup of tea, every waterfall, 60 per cent of you and me, the most expensive champagne, your dog’s territorial liquid markers, and the snow covering the top of Everest.”A dazzle of stories beautifully told…. Czerski argues throughout that to truly see the miraculous oceans, to understand and to feel our connection to them, is vital and integral to our history and our future. Her outstanding book advances that understanding and honours that connection. Her readers will see the seas anew.—Horatio Clare, Telegraph (UK) The oceans are full of water, and water is just water, so there’s not much to know, right? Wrong. Far from being homogenous, the water in our oceans varies in temperature, salinity and depth, among other things. It’s affected by the weather and affects the weather. Some parts are well mixed and others remain stratified. I recommend Blue Machine if you want to find out more about how whales are affected by war and where there’s a secret sound tunnel.