Gone: A search for what remains of the world’s extinct creatures

Michael Blencowe, the author of this moving memento about creatures that no longer exist, had in his youth formed a fascination for extinct organisms. In this book, he selects eleven recently vanished forms, several of which are new to this reader. The Great Auk, the Dodo bird, and the Pinta Island Tortoise have been noted earlier, but the stories of the avian Spectacled Cormorant, the Moa, the Huia, and the Kokako were unfamiliar. Amazingly the history of the Steller’s Sea Cow produced a cry of dismay, as did the mystery of the disappearance of the Ivell’s Sea Anemone and Schomburgk’s Deer, as did the Xerces Blue butterfly. Along with exquisitely painted representations of each subject, the author traces the location, historical figures, last sightings, and reports on each subject. He mournfully visits the sites where most were last seen and reverently reviews their remains at the various museums. In this search for these extinct creatures, he travels through England, New Zealand, Thailand, the Galapagos, San Francisco, and elsewhere. His accounts point out how human predation, the introduction of non-native mammals, loss of habitat, environmental mistakes, and climate change contribute to species loss, and ongoing current evil. A timely read about fascinating animals by a gifted chronicler.