JSV Book Club: The Underworld with Susan Casey
Join the Jackson Square Ventures Book Club for a fireside chat with Susan Casey, author of The Underworld: Journeys to the Depths of the Ocean.
The conversation will be moderated by Greg Gretsch, Co-founder and Managing Director of Jackson Square Ventures. We’ll kick off the evening with cocktails, wine, beer, and hors d’oeuvres during a social hour, followed by an engaging discussion that dives deep into Susan’s work and the mysteries of the ocean.
About The Underworld: Journeys to the Depths of the Ocean:
NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER • From bestselling author Susan Casey, an awe-inspiring portrait of the mysterious world beneath the waves, and the men and women who seek to uncover its secrets
“An irresistible mix of splendid scholarship, heart-stopping adventure writing, and vivid, visceral prose.” —Sy Montgomery, New York Times best-selling author of The Soul of an Octopus
For all of human history, the deep ocean has been a source of wonder and terror, an unknown realm that evoked a singular, compelling question: What’s down there? Unable to answer this for centuries, people believed the deep was a sinister realm of fiendish creatures and deadly peril. But now, cutting-edge technologies allow scientists and explorers to dive miles beneath the surface, and we are beginning to understand this strange and exotic underworld: A place of soaring mountains, smoldering volcanoes, and valleys 7,000 feet deeper than Everest is high, where tectonic plates collide and separate, and extraordinary life forms operate under different rules. Far from a dark void, the deep is a vibrant realm that’s home to pink gelatinous predators and shimmering creatures a hundred feet long and ancient animals with glass skeletons and sharks that live for half a millennium—among countless other marvels.
Susan Casey is our premiere chronicler of the aquatic world. For The Underworld she traversed the globe, joining scientists and explorers on dives to the deepest places on the planet, interviewing the marine geologists, marine biologists, and oceanographers who are searching for knowledge in this vast unseen realm. She takes us on a fascinating journey through the history of deep-sea exploration, from the myths and legends of the ancient world to storied shipwrecks we can now reach on the bottom, to the first intrepid bathysphere pilots, to the scientists who are just beginning to understand the mind-blowing complexity and ecological importance of the quadrillions of creatures who live in realms long thought to be devoid of life.
Throughout this journey, she learned how vital the deep is to the future of the planet, and how urgent it is that we understand it in a time of increasing threats from climate change, industrial fishing, pollution, and the mining companies that are also exploring its depths. The Underworld is Susan Casey’s most beautiful and thrilling book yet, a gorgeous evocation of the natural world and a powerful call to arms.
About Susan Casey:
Susan Casey is the author of four New York Times bestsellers: The Devil’s Teeth: A True Story of Obsession and Survival Among America’s Great White Sharks; The Wave: In Pursuit of the Rogues, Freaks, and Giants of the Ocean; Voices in the Ocean: A Journey Into the Wild and Haunting World of Dolphins; and The Underworld: Journeys to the Depths of the Ocean. Casey’s immersive reporting, scientific research, and evocative prose have made her books classics of adventure writing. In a review of her book, The Underworld, the president of the Rachel Carson Council wrote, “Is Susan Casey the next Rachel Carson? Yes.”
Casey is the former editor-in-chief of O, The Oprah Magazine, and also served as editor in chief of Sports Illustrated Women; development editor and editor-at-large for Time Inc.; and creative director of Outside magazine, where she was part of the editorial team that made history when it won three consecutive National Magazine Awards for General Excellence. Under her editorship, O, The Oprah Magazine also won a National Magazine Award for General Excellence, and a Clarion Award from The Association for Women in Communications. She is a national fellow of The Explorers Club, and a presenter for the Smithsonian Institution.
Her work has been featured in the Best American Science and Nature Writing, Best American Sports Writing, and Best American Magazine Writing anthologies; and has appeared in Vanity Fair, Esquire, Outside, Sports Illustrated, Fortune, Time, and National Geographic, among other publications. She has made numerous television appearances, including “The Oprah Winfrey Show,” “The Daily Show with Jon Stewart,” “Charlie Rose,” “Conan,” “Anderson Cooper 360,” “Nightline,” “Good Morning America,” “Today,” “The CBS Morning Show,” and others. Casey is also a frequent guest on NPR.