"Spotte is a master storyteller, bringing to life the coal miners, gang members, and Inuits he meets on his travels . . . As an ode to watery places, this book is sometimes reminiscent of work by writers such as David James Duncan . . . Recommended for readers of memoir and those interested in the intersection between culture and the environment." Library Journal "A lively survey that blends marine insights with a first-person autobiography . . . a particularly inviting read that stands out from the crowd of either science books or autobiographical pieces." Midwest Book Review “Gripping reading…an in-your-face honesty.” —Bookpleasures "Stephen Spotte shares accounts of his life . . . starting with his early days in West Virginia and chronicling his time living in a bohemian beach town, and eventually his work as a marine biologist. . . . Spotte has worked with the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, the New York Aquarium and Aquarium of Niagara Falls, as well as the Sea Research Foundation at the Universityof Connecticut and the Coral Reef Ecology Program in Turks and Caicos." Sea Technology Magazine
“The most memorable and important anti-hero’s journey memoir I have read since Fred Exley’s A FAN’S NOTES.” —Chuck Kinder, author of Honeymooners, A Cautionary Tale
“He doesn't say so, but of course Stephen Spotte knows that his watery self, fiction or no, animates a body of water—his body, the one we find adrift through these pages, seeking its own level in the spirit of camaraderie and adventure and, yes, science too. But the real action here is beneath the surface, where self and thoughts submerged in the murky depths of being bring a "froggish comfort" and to commingle even with pond scum bespeaks a "silent knowledge." When diving into the storied deep, our intrepid author intimates, we must do more than merely spit into our masks to see what lies in wait for us.” —Joe Amato, author, Samuel Taylor’s Last Night
"With the author who says he “always drifts close to water during those times of the unrelieved sorries,” and is forever inflating our life jackets, we tread a lot of water: from a whale capture off the Arctic Hudson in Manitoba; to acid-tinged lifeguarding off Jersey; to Coney Island’s Aquarium and Osborn Lab, which he curated; to Niagara Falls, where he built his first aquarium; to the reefs of John Pennecamp; and into the Mystic, Connecticut. A scientist who never lost his feel for the fluidity also available in the play of language—and people—Spotte gives us a fine ride from the beginning.” —Kass Fleisher, author, The Bear River Massacre and the Making of History
“Stephen Spotte, PhD, probably best considered a marine scientist, can certainly be portrayed as a renaissance man extraordinaire. He continues to perform brilliantly in many different fields . . . For those readers who know Steve or his scientific works and would like to know more about him, My Watery Self is that opportunity . . . Most scientists do not write memoirs, especially ones that might make the reader wonder, with all the associated ‘wild’ experiences with alcohol and chemicals, how the biographer ever became a bonafide professional scientist. . . . A spectrum of thrills.”
—From the Introduction by Robin M. Overstreet, PhD, Professor Emeritus, Department of Coastal Sciences, Universityof Southern Mississippi
"[T]he Spotte universe [is] a world that's all about perception, the objects that may be closer then they appear - including people. It's a world in which the ridiculous is so ridiculous, and so regrettable, that it requires no irony whatsoever. Just the facts, expressed in a beautiful, on-point prose style. . . .[Spotte is] a writer better than nearly all contemporary literary artists put together." —American Book Review
"As memoir, this book illustrates beautifully how a talent for empirical observation advances the aims of prose narrative. What ultimately emerges is a subtle disquisition on the relationship between the scientific mind and its literary executor." —American Book Review
“[Spotte’s] stories are funny and outlandish.” —San Francisco Book Review
02/15/2015
Spotte (Coastal Florida Gardening: A Botanical Perspective) provides this account of his life as a lover of aquatic habitats. In a series of stories about his childhood, his bohemian life, and his work as a curator of aquariums, the author repeatedly circles back to water—from creeks polluted by coal tailings in West Virginia to tropical water in Florida and beluga habitats on Churchill River. Spotte is a master storyteller, bringing to life the coal miners, gang members, and Inuits he meets on his travels. The author's account of his work in curating aquariums is particularly timely, considering the recent release of the movie Blackfish. Though frank in discussing the part he played in capturing sharks and whales during 1960–80s, Spotte describes these activities as regrettable but common to the time period. As an ode to watery places, this book is sometimes reminiscent of work by writers such as David James Duncan. VERDICT Recommended for readers of memoir and those interested in the intersection between culture and the environment.—Talea Anderson, College Place, WA
