Why Fish Don't Exist: A Story of Loss, Love, and the Hidden Order of Life

Why Fish Don't Exist is the amazing first book of a remarkable new nonfiction voice. It is a dark and amazing story of love, anarchy, scientific obsession, and maybe even murder.

Taxonomist David Starr Jordan was driven by a desire to organise the natural world. He would eventually be recognised for having found over half of all fish known to humans during his time. However, the cosmos seemed to be trying harder to stop him the more of the life's secret plan he discovered. Lightning, fire, and finally the 1906 San Francisco earthquake destroyed his specimen collections, sending thousands of his findings—which were kept in delicate glass jars—tumbling to the ground. His whole life's effort was destroyed in an instant.

Many may have surrendered, succumbed to hopelessness. However, Jordan? Examining the debris underneath him, he located the first fish he identified and proceeded with confidence to reassemble his collection. And this time, he brought in one ingenious invention that he thought would finally shield his work from the craziness of the outside world.

Lulu Miller, an NPR reporter, first thought Jordan was telling a joke—a cautionary story of arrogance or denial—when she heard this narrative in passing. But she started to worry about him as her own life fell apart. Maybe, instead, he served as an example of how to go on even when everything looked lost. Her perspective on morals, history, and the world around her would all be altered by what she would learn about his life.

Why Fish Don't Exist is a book that is equal parts science fiction, memoir, and biography. It reads like a tale about finding strength in the face of uncontrollable disaster.