Nerdette Book Club: Sabrina Imbler on ‘How Far the Light Reaches’

Nerdette

WBEZ

Tv & Film, Self, Nerd, Books, Technology, Tv, Improvement, Culture, Wbez, Society & Culture, Pop, Nerdette, Nerds

4.7 • 1.4K Ratings

🗓️ 7 February 2023

⏱️ 24 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

February’s book club pick is ‘How Far the Light Reaches: A Life in Ten Sea Creatures’ by Sabrina Imbler. From a mother octopus, to shimmering salps on the shores of a queer beach, to predatory worms, Sabrina looks at each creature as a symbol for their own life experiences. Part memoir, part science journalism, their essays explore themes of survival, gender, care, and joy. Sabrina joined us for this spoiler-free conversation about the book. We talked about what draws them to the sea, craft, and “charismatic creatures.” You can join in the conversation too! Record a voice memo with your thoughts on the book and email the file to NerdettePodcast [at] Gmail [dot] com by February 23. We will try to include your voice in our panel conversation! Here’s one question that you can answer: what sea creature do you identify with and why?

Transcript

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0:00.0	Education this week is a weekly newsletter for parents navigating schools
0:04.4	in Chicago and the suburbs from reporters at WBEZ and the Chicago Sun Times.
0:09.3	Sign up now just in time for back to school at WBEZ.org slash education news.
0:15.4	From WBEZ Chicago, I'm Greta Johnson and this is the Nerd Up Book Club.
0:24.6	It's just like a regular book club except sometimes the author stops by.
0:28.5	It is the month of February and our book this month is Sabrina Imblers'
0:32.8	Lovely Science Reporting Meets memoir called How Far The Light Reaches.
0:38.2	Each chapter is a reflection on a sea creature.
0:41.4	Whales or goldfish or cuddlefish for example,
0:44.6	but Sabrina looks at each ocean animal as a symbol of their own life experience.
0:49.8	It's a book that's full of marvel and joy and honesty.
0:53.6	When Sabrina isn't writing books, they're a staff writer at DeFactor where they report
0:57.7	on creatures Sabrina, welcome to Nerd Up.
1:00.3	Thank you so much for having me Greta and thank you for that lovely introduction.
1:03.8	Oh, can I just say I think creatures is like perhaps the most amazing beat I've ever heard of.
1:09.5	I feel like the luckiest person in the world.
1:11.4	Like I, yeah, earlier today was just looking at footage footage of worms in swarms,
1:17.6	like swarms and blobs of worms.
1:19.4	The swarm worms?
1:20.6	Yeah.
1:25.0	That's so delightful, I love it.
1:27.7	Okay, so I keep thinking of this book as like a sciencey memoir,
	...

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