Pickering Creek Audubon Center and the Talbot Bird Club of the Maryland Ornithological Society will cohost author Jonathan White as he speaks about his new book Tides: The Science and Spirit of the Ocean at the Eastern Shore Conservation Center on the evening of April 17. 

In Tides: The Science and Spirit of the Ocean, writer, sailor and surfer Jonathan White takes readers across the globe to discover the science and spirit of ocean tides. In the Arctic, he shimmies under the ice with an Inuit elder to hunt for mussels in the dark cavities left behind at low tide; in China, he races the Silver Dragon, a twenty-five foot tidal bore that crashes eighty miles up the Qiantang River; in France, he interviews the monks that live in the tide-wrapped monastery of Mont St. Michel; in Chile and Scotland, he investigates the growth of tidal power generation; and in Panama and Venice, he delves into how the threat of sea level rise is changing human culture – the very old and very new. With lyrical prose, colorful adventure travel, and provocative scientific inquiry, Tides explores the force that keeps our planet’s waters in constant motion. Carl Safina, author of Song for the Blue Ocean says, “This is not really a book “about” tides, though tides are a main character. It’s about life’s literal ups and downs. About mysterious pulls and invisible forces. About rhythms and pulses and seasons and the flowings of vast living migrations along coasts and through deep oceans. Along the way, you learn a lot of things about actual tides. Astounding things that you never knew you didn’t know. A wondrous book, full of heart.”

Jonathan enjoys speaking to audiences of all kinds. He has given talks and keynote presentations at museums, aquariums, yacht clubs, government institutions, book clubs, writing conferences, grade schools, bookstores, and universities. Sailors, surfers, fishers, divers, kayakers, and beachcombers all know the importance of time and tide, but most people don’t know how complex and poetic the phenomenon is. How do you explain, for example, that the tide is twenty-eight feet on the west side of Panama and only ten inches on the east side? Or that some places see one tide a day, while others see two or even six tides a day? What’s a double high tide, or a double low tide? These are among the topics Jonathan has fun describing, illustrated with photographs and stories — and always in simple, accessible language that emphasizes the tide’s mystery and beauty. Peter Matthiessen, author of The Snow Leopard says of Tides, “Jonathan White provides us in this fine, fascinating book with a clear understanding of the infinitely complex and wild nature of our planet’s tidal forces in all their mystery and beauty.”

The talk begins at 7 p.m. at the Eastern Shore Conservation Center, 114 S. Washington Street, Easton. A book signing follows.