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Review ------ “A sensitive and sturdy work of environmental history. . . . [Davis] has a well-stocked mind, and frequently views the history of the Gulf through the prism of artists and writers including Winslow Homer, Wallace Stevens, Ernest Hemingway and John D. MacDonald. His prose is supple and clear. . . . A cri de coeur about the Gulf’s environmental ruin.” - Dwight Garner, New York Times “A wide-ranging, well-told story, by turns informative, lyrical, inspiring and chilling for anyone who cares about the future of ‘America’s Sea.’” - Gerard Helferich, Wall Street Journal “This scholarly magnum opus is quite long, but it reads like a novel. Students of writing, history, ecology and the environment will be riveted by this book, and I think it should be required reading for every American, especially those in the White House. If you read only two books about the environment this year, make this one of those two.” - Forbes “In the tradition of Jared Diamond's best-seller Collapse and Simon Winchester's Atlantic comes Jack E. Davis' nonfiction epic, The Gulf: The Making of an American Sea, which strives both to celebrate and defend its subject―the Gulf of Mexico. . . . Detailed and exhaustive, written in lucid, impeccable prose, The Gulf is a fine work of information and in, destined to be admired and cited.” - William J. Cobb, Dallas Morning News “Splendid . . . . Davis is a historian, and this book is packed with research, but The Gulf does not read like a textbook. He is a graceful, clear, often lyrical writer who makes sometimes surprising, always illuminating connections―it's not a stretch to compare him to John McPhee. And he is telling an important story, especially for those of us who live around what he calls the American Sea. What happens to it happens to us, and the more we know, the better equipped we'll be to deal with a future on its shores.” - Colette Bancroft, Tampa Bay Times “An incisive, comprehensive and entertaining portrait of the world’s most diverse and productive marine ecosystems―from its lusty birth in the chaos of shifting continental plates to its slow and agonizing death of a million cuts inflicted by oil and extractors, dredge-and-fill operators, ‘condo-canyon’ developers, industrial-scale fishers, fertilizer-dependent farmers, entrepreneurs, love-it-to-death snow birds and so many more. . . . Amid all of the and exploitation, this could easily have been a grim history of ‘Paradise Lost.’ But in Davis’ skilled hands it as much love story as tragedy.” - Ron Cunningham, Gainesville Sun “Jack Davis has delivered a unique and illuminating history of the American Southern coast and sea as it should be written: how humanity and the environment evolved over ten millennia as a single system.” - Edward O. Wilson, author of The Social Conquest of Earth “This vast and well-told story shows how we made the Gulf of Mexico, in particular, into what local activists have be to call a 'national sacrifice zone,' at enormous cost to its residents of all species. It’s a sobering tale, and one hopes that reading it will help us hit bottom and acknowledge the need to change.” - Bill McKibben, author Eaarth: Making a Life on a Tough New Planet “A tremendous book. Davis is not only one of our preeminent environmental historians, but also a first-rate storyteller and prose stylist. Lay readers and scholars alike will be delighted by The Gulf, a lovely evocation of the natural world and the problematic ways our nation has profited from it.” - Blake Bailey, author of Cheever “Hunt's compact book should serve as the first port of call for students and general readers interested in how historians have interpreted and reinterpreted the emergence of the world around them.” - Mark Kurlansky, author of Paper: Paging Through History Read more ( javascript:void(0) ) About the Author ---------------- Jack E. Davis is the author of the award-winning An Everglades Providence: Marjory Stoneman Douglas and the American Environmental Century. A professor of environmental history at the University of Florida, he grew up on the Gulf coast, and now lives in Florida and New Hampshire. Read more ( javascript:void(0) )