When Lulu Miller's relationship falls apart, she turns to an unlikely figure for guidance - the 19th-century naturalist, David Starr Jordan. Pouring over his diaries, Lulu discovers a man obsessed with nature's hidden order, devoted to studying shimmering scales and sailing the world in search of new species of fish.
After the 1906 San Francisco earthquake sends more than a thousand of Jordan's specimens, housed in glass jars, plummeting to the ground, his story of resilience leads Lulu to believe she has found the antidote to life's unpredictability. But lurking behind the tale of this great taxonomist lies a darker story waiting to be told: one about the human cost of attempting to define the form of things unknown.
An idiosyncratic, personal approach to this fascinating scientific biography, Why Fish Don't Exist is an astonishing tale of newfound love, scientific discovery and how to live well in a world governed by chaos.
“At one point, Miller dives into the ocean into a school of fish…comes up for air, and realizes she’s in love. That’s how I felt: Her book took me to strange depths I never imagined, and I was smitten.” —The New York Times Book Review
“What a delightful book... Ms. Miller [spins] a tale so seductive that I read her book in one sitting.”
— The Wall Street Journal
“Some years back, Lulu Miller disappeared down a very strange rabbit hole that led her to places neither she nor you would ever be able to anticipate. I highly recommend you follow her down the hole, because of her singular and gigantic gifts as a writer and storyteller, but also because of what's down there: love, chaos, strychnine, a gun, dangerous delusions, heroic dandelions, a cow, a snorkel mask through which grander truths are revealed... This book is perfect, just perfect. It's both lyrical and learned, personal and political, small and huge, quirky and profound.”
— Mary Roach, New York Times bestselling author of Stiff
“Completely entrancing.”
— O, The Oprah Magazine
“Riveting and rollicking… total magic.”
— Garden & Gun
“I want to live at this book’s address: the intersection of history and biology and wonder and failure and sheer human stubbornness. What a sumptuous, surprising, dark delight.”
— Carmen Maria Machado, author of Her Body and Other Parties