The daily Astorian., July 19, 2018, Page 21, Image 20

JULY 19, 2018 // 21
BOOKMONGER
Whales inspire careers, passion projects
F
or the generations
that have grown up
on the expansive
lyrics of Woody Guthrie’s
“This Land Is Your Land,”
it’s been hard to come to
grips with the notion that
this land and these waters
and “that endless skyway”
actually do have a limited
carrying capacity for every-
thing the human race seems
to be throwing at it.
The consequences of
global warming and polluted
groundwater and acidified
oceans clotted with plastic
debris aren’t easy to face,
but folks can choose to
succumb to malaise and
cynicism, or they can get
motivated to work on solu-
tions.
And that’s just what
Bainbridge Island author
Rebecca Pillsbury chronicles
in her latest book.
Pillsbury’s particular
passion is for whales and
their well-being. In “Guided
by Whales,” she interviews
nearly two dozen individuals
devoted to advocating for
cetaceans, improving their
habitat and reversing the
current, precarious state of
many whale species.
Like the people she spot-
lights in this book, Pillsbury
is convinced that humans
have much to learn from
these giant creatures, who
have brains that are heavier
and up to seven times larger
than humans’. She reports
that whale brains not only
have more convoluted ce-
rebral cortexes than human
brains, they also have a lobe
that human brains do not
— something that, scien-
tists believe, has to do with
processing emotions.
Furthermore, while
modern humans — Homo
sapiens — have been kick-
ing around for just a couple
Author Rebecca Pillsbury
author David Neiwert, who
wrote the 2015 book “Of
Orcas and Men.”
But you’ll also meet
amazing characters like Aus-
tralia-based activist/mural
artist Howie Cooke (“Where
“Guided by Whales”
By Rebecca Pillsbury
Duende Press
244 pp
$15.95
there’s a wall, there’s a
whale”), origami artist and
“sperm whale groupie”
Peggy Oki, and self-styled
professional mermaid Han-
nah Fraser.
These engaging stories
of conservation, educa-
tion, research and activism
demonstrate a wide range
of approaches one might
adopt in order to help whale
recovery efforts.
“If you’re only noticing
the negative, you’re hanging
out with the wrong people,”
Pillsbury advises.
Instead, she urges, now
is the time to “wake up and
act.”
The Bookmonger is Bar-
bara Lloyd McMichael, who
writes this weekly column
focusing on the books, au-
thors and publishers of the
Pacific Northwest. Contact
her at bkmonger@nwlink.
com.
Crossword Answers
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PHOTOS COURTESY DUENDE PRESS
The cover of Rebecca Pillsbury’s ‘Guided by Whales.’
of hundred thousand years,
the whale species we know
today have been around for
tens of millions of years, and
their remarkable evolution
can be traced from land
mammal to oceanic kingpin.
Whales demonstrate
cooperation, tolerance, play-
fulness and an empathy that
perhaps surpasses human
understanding. Pillsbury
proposes, and she is not
alone, that over their long
history, whales may have
solved some of the existen-
tial questions that bedevil
humans to this day.
Pillsbury talks with
educators, artists, scientists,
activists, storytellers and
others. Her aim is to get
more people to be more pro-
active in protecting whales
and their habitat, and her
tactic is to tell the inspiring
personal stories of folks who
are doing just that, in a myri-
ad of ways.
Some of her interview
subjects may be familiar
names to Pacific Northwest
readers: husband and wife
team Howard Garrett and
Susan Berta, founders of
the Orca Network; How-
ard’s brother Ken Balcomb,
founder of the Center for
Whale Research; and Seattle
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