... [a] delving, haunted and poetic debut. Giggs is worth reading for her spotlight observations and lyricism alone, but she also has an important message to deliver.

Giggs has an eye for unforgettable and disturbing details that probe at the ancient and ongoing relationship between humans and whales.

Giggs’ meticulous research is itself awesome. Every page has its breathtaking revelations. The slant light of facts reveals humanity’s own animal nature.

[A] scintillating debut.

... delving and lyrically precise.

... widens the aperture of our attention with a literary style so stunning that the reader may forget to blink.

Lyrical.

... immersive.

The question that the book poses concerns more than just whales. It is demonstrative of the fact that within the whale, both archetype and, painfully, the material bodies of actual whales, is matter with which to divine the whole world. This book is an act of divination: Giggs reads the debris as tea leaves.

What makes Fathoms a curious work, when viewed from the perspective of its environmentalism, is that even as it is acknowledging the disgrace of these tangible realities, it is preoccupied with nature as an abstraction in a way that remains stubbornly anthropocentric. It argues that the preservation of wild spaces is important, not simply for the sake of the animals who live in them, or for the pragmatic reason that human beings are ultimately as dependent on the health and sustainability of the planet’s fragile ecosystems as any other living creature, but for the sake of our psychological wellbeing.

... should be lauded for its ambition. From the inciting event of the first pages – the author’s encounter with a beached whale in Australia – the book launches into a globe-ranging account of the ecological and cultural significance of whales. Each page is dense with history and anecdotes, facts and figures and musings both personal and philosophical on the nature of whales and, in particular, the relationship between humanity and these almost-alien creatures.

Fathoms shows whales to be what humans have long suspected: not just enormous but enormously complex, with lives and capacities that made them masters of the seas. Until we showed up.

... a research project that encompasses not only physical and ecological elements, but also artistic representations and philosophy. Giggs presents the bounty of that scholarship in crisp, creatively written chapters addressing the many layers of the whale population’s unique physiology and evolutionary history, sociality, above-water balletic athleticism, and enigmatic 'biophony' of their vocalizations. Most importantly, she analyzes how their behavior can be predictive for the Earth’s future. An adventurous explorer, the author immerses readers in an Australian whale watching tour and then dips into the deep international waters of Japan, where whaling ships flourish. With a conservationist mindset, Giggs reiterates that the whale and its life, legacy, and precarious environmental state are reflective of the greater issues the Earth faces, from ecological upheaval to overconsumption. Whether describing the majesty of the blue whale or the human assault on sea ecology due to paper and plastic pollution, the author’s prose is poetic, beautifully smooth, urgently readable, and eloquently informative. Her passion for whales leaps off the page, urging readers to care and—even more so—become involved in their protection and preservation. Throughout the book, the author’s debut, she brilliantly exposes 'how regular human life seeped into the habitats of wildlife, and how wildlife returned back to us, the evidence of our obliviousness.' Refreshingly, she also reveals glimmers of hope regarding what whales can teach the human race about our capacity to ecologically coexist with the natural world.