The Gospel of the Eels

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A tender, informed, beautiful and rare book about what is, essentially, a strange creature. The first few pages alone are enough to convince the most hardened city dweller, who knows nothing about fishing, of the need to give the eel a literary homage.' Dagens NyheterThe European eel is one of the strangest creatures in existence. Born as a tiny willow-leaf-shaped larva in the Sargasso Sea, it travels the ocean currents to the coasts of Europe where it transforms into a glass, then a yellow, eel. After a solitary life lasting decades, hiding from light and science, it morphs into a silver eel and returns to the Sargasso where it breeds and dies. Yet, no human has ever seen eels reproduce. No one can give a complete account of the eel's metamorphoses or say why they are born and die in the Sargasso Sea. And now the eel is disappearing, and we don't know exactly why. In this unique natural science memoir, Patrik Svensson describes his ongoing fascination with this the secret life of eels, but also the equally perplexing and often murky relationship he shared with his late father, whose only passion in life was fishing for this elusive creature. Following the eel's traces through literature, history and modern marine biology, Svensson tells a story of life, death and nature. The Gospel of the Eels is a memoir of grief, an exploration of masculinity and a riveting journey through the life of the world's most mysterious fish.'Fascinating . . . as difficult to categorise, as it is to put down. It's a mix between a philosophical essay, popular science, cultural and class history and a coming-of-age story that uses different bait to try and hook its slippery object of study. ' Göteborgs-Posten