Eels: An Exploration, from New Zealand to the Sargasso, of the World's Most Mysterious Fish [Hardcover]

James Prosek (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: September 21, 2010

They are the only fish that spawn in the middle of the ocean but spend their adult lives in freshwater. They can overcome seemingly insurmountable obstacles and even cross over land. They are revered as guardians and monster-seducers by New Zealand’s Maori and have inspired origin myths throughout the Pacific Islands. Often viewed with disgust in the West, they are a multibillion-dollar business in the Asian food market. And they are often mistaken for snakes. They are eels—one of the world’s most amazing and least understood fish. (Yes, fish.)

James Prosek offers a fascinating tour through the life history and cultural associations of the freshwater eel, exploring its biology in streams and epic migrations in the ocean, its myth and lore, its mystery and beauty. Prosek travels the globe to tell the story of the eel—from New York to New Zealand; from Europe to Japan and the small island of Pohnpei in Micronesia, where freshwater eels are worshipped by members of the eel clan. Along the way he introduces individuals whose lives are most connected with the eels’ story—including fishermen, conservationists, and scientists seeking to uncover the eels’ elusive home in the Sargasso Sea and their spawning places in other oceans of the world. Though freshwater eels have been here for hundreds of millions of years, populations are rapidly declining, due largely to dams, overfishing, pollution, and perhaps even global climate change.

Illustrated with original etchings by the author, Eels is a mesmerizing biography and history of this intriguing and mysterious creature. It is also a telling look at humanity, the will to persist, and the ever-changing relationship between man and the natural world.

Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly

Ask your average North American: eels, those slimy snakelike creatures, are generally held in poor regard. For nature writer Prosek (Trout; Fly-Fishing the 41st), however, they are a compelling mystery, and in his riveting synthesis of cultural, geographical, and botanical sleuthing, he investigates their reputation at home and abroad. The author--for whom the eel was once merely bait for bass--delves into the closely held traditions of the Maori of New Zealand, where eels are revered; into the beliefs of the Micronesian island of Pohnpei, where eels are considered members of a tribal clan; into the heart of the largest seafood market in the world, in Japan, a nation that consumes more than 130,000 tons of eels each year; into the reclusive world of Eel Weir Hollow in the Catskills, where fisherman Ray traps and smokes as much as one ton of eels a season; and to the fabled Sargasso Sea, where eels are thought to start their trek to the world's lakes, rivers, and streams--though, even now, no one knows precisely where the world's population of eels spawns, an enduring scientific mystery awaiting a solution.
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From Booklist

The freshwater eel is born in the Sargasso Sea, makes its way at random to a freshwater stream in Europe or the U.S. (and doesn’t make a mistake and end up on the wrong continent), and after many years makes its way back to the Sargasso to spawn and die. A baffling fish, there are 15 species of freshwater eels found all over the world. Prosek (Trout: An Illustrated History, 1996) points out that eels are not an easy fish to like; they’re snakelike and don’t act like normal fish (they can slither through the grass on wet nights to find food or new bodies of water). But his fascination with eels took him to New Zealand, where the longfin eel can live more than 100 years and grow to more than 80 pounds. Eels are big business in Japan. The tale of Ray Turner, a man who still fishes for eels the traditional way with a hand-built weir, is at the heart of the book, tying the mythology, the mystery, and the commerce of eels together into his story. --Nancy Bent

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Product Details

• Hardcover: 304 pages
• Publisher: Harper (September 21, 2010)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0060566116
• ISBN-13: 978-0060566111
• Product Dimensions: 8.5 x 5.8 x 1.1 inches
• Shipping Weight: 13.6 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.3 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (48 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #310,088 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

More About the Author

James Prosek is a writer and artist whose books include Trout: An Illustrated History; Joe and Me: An Education in Fishing and Friendship; The Complete Angler: A Connecticut Yankee Follows in the Footsteps of Walton; and Fly-Fishing the 41st. He lives in Easton, Connecticut.

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

10 of 10 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars A PLEASING AND INFORMATIVE READ, September 14, 2010

By 

D. Blankenship (The Ozarks) - See all my reviews
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This review is from: Eels: An Exploration, from New Zealand to the Sargasso, of the World's Most Mysterious Fish (Hardcover)

(What's this?)

I personally found this to be an extremely fascinating read. The book of course is about eels; a fish that we really know very little about. But the book covers so much more that just this primary subject.

The author takes us from the United States, to New Zeeland and on to the orient and then the Polynesian Island. This work is not merely the study of a specific species of fish; it is also the study of a number of indigenous peoples around the world and their interaction with eels, both as a food source and that of a spiritual nature.

This work takes us unto the world of eels; eels as food, eels as religious symbols (for more than one culture) and eels as another indicator of the problems we are having in our environment.

The author has done what I would consider a good job on his research, but must admit that my endorsement in this area is rather shaky, as I knew absolutely nothing of eels before reading this work. My only encounter with one of their tribe is when I accidently caught on fishing near the coast in Virginia a number of years ago and spent ten minutes dancing around like my head was in fire trying to figure out how I was going to get the thing off the hook without injuring either the eel or myself. Anyway, I took the author's word as to the facts and figures he presented.

The book is well written and is an easy and enjoyable read. My only objection to the work, an this is purely personal, is that I would have like to have read a bit more about the actual eels and less about their impact on some of the cultures addressed in the book. Others may find this a good thing though.

As with most books of this nature lately, I finished it and found myself more than a bit depressed. It would seem that we humans are mucking up the world of eels and if things keep going in the current direction, we may soon only be able to read about yet another extinct animal.

Don Blankenship
The Ozarks

7 of 7 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars Wet and slimy... and sacred? (3.5 stars), September 11, 2010

By 

J. Green (Los Angeles, California) - See all my reviews
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This review is from: Eels: An Exploration, from New Zealand to the Sargasso, of the World's Most Mysterious Fish (Hardcover)

(What's this?)

I think most people know that salmon are born in freshwater rivers and migrate to the oceans where they spend their lives before returning to the river of their birth to spawn. But who knew that freshwater eels do the exact opposite? They're born in the ocean and then find their way into freshwater rivers around the world. They'll spend their lives - perhaps as long as 50 to 100 years - in those freshwater rivers before migrating back to the place of their birth in the ocean to spawn and die. Interestingly, however, no one has seen them spawning and the locations aren't precisely known (American and European eels spawn somewhere in the Sargasso Sea, and scientists now think they've found the area where Japanese eels spawn). Nor is it known how they find their way there, or how they find their way into the many rivers where they spend their lives.

Having recently enjoyed Four Fish: The Future of the Last Wild Food by Paul Greenberg, this book caught my eye. Author James Prosek has travelled extensively studying eels and their place in various cultures - the Maori in New Zealand, the east coast of the US, Japan, and the island of Pohnpei in Micronesia (missing is Europe). However - and in contrast to Four Fish - he focuses mostly on the cultural (or perhaps it would be more correct to say "ethnological") aspects of the eel and the book frequently takes a mystical approach to the subject. The chapters on the Maori were especially long (and tedious) with a multitude of personal stories and their reverence for the eel. The Pohnpeians take that reverence even further and practically worship the eel, whereas most other cultures value it as a food item (the Pilgrims likely ate eel instead of turkey at the first Thanksgiving).

Prosek has illustrated the book with his own drawings, which are quite good, but often the actual photo (particularly those of people he met in his travels) would have been better. A good book if you're interested in culture, but disappointing if you're looking for biology and science.

1 of 1 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Fascinating and Informative Cultural and Scientific Study of Eels, November 20, 2010

By 

M. T. Vancampen (Houston, TX) - See all my reviews
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This review is from: Eels: An Exploration, from New Zealand to the Sargasso, of the World's Most Mysterious Fish (Hardcover)

(What's this?)

I thoroughly enjoyed this book. When I first picked it up, I was expecting a popular scientific treatise on the fish and the search for where they spawn. This makes up part of the book...but there is so much more. Prosek travels all over the world to exam cultural traditions surrounding the eel. We follow Prosek as he learn about the Maori's reverance for the eel and stories from the island of Pohnpei, where the eel is viewed as a god. Prosek goes to Japan, the nation that consumes the most eels per capita, and visits the biggest seafood market in the world. He also introduces us to a fisherman in the Catskills and goes along with him as he traps eel. While reading this book, I found myself constantly sharing new bits of information with family, friends, and colleagues. A book so fascinating that it compels me to share what I read is the type of non-fiction book I love to discover. This book is just such a book.