Published in 2020 (first published 2017)
256 pages
When Danna Staaf met an octopus at the age of ten, it changed her life. She set up a saltwater aquarium to keep eight-armed pets in her bedroom, learned to scuba dive off the coast closest to her home in Southern California, and eventually earned a PhD in the biology of squid babies. Currently working as a science writer, she also wields words in the world of fiction, and helps her husband raise two story-hungry children.
What is this book about?
An epic and fun history spanning from the mollusks that invented swimming to the octopuses and other intelligent cephalopods of today
Before mammals, there were dinosaurs. And before dinosaurs, there were cephalopods—the ancestors of modern squid, octopuses, and more creatures—Earth’s first truly substantial animals. Essentially inventing the act of swimming, cephalopods presided over an undersea empire for millions of years—until fish evolved jaws, and cephalopods had to step up their game or risk being eaten. To keep up, some streamlined their shells and added defensive spines, while others abandoned the shell, opening the gates to a flood of evolutionary innovations: masterful camouflage, fin-supplemented jet propulsion, and intelligence we’ve yet to fully measure. Monarchs of the Sea is an epic, witty history about these bizarre but beautiful creatures that ruled the seas—and still captivate us today.
