Many Things Under a Rock

Early on in Many Things Under a Rock, author and marine biologist David Scheel describes a colleague’s first encounter with a huge and curious octopus, effortlessly conveying the enigmatic beauty and wonder of the event in less than a page of prose. It is just one expertly told story among a myriad of others, collectively filling a book which is as much about the ways we relate to and interact with octopuses as it is about the animals themselves.

To tell these stories, Scheel draws on his own decades of experience in the field, famous octopus encounters of history and legend, as well as the traditional knowledge of Indigenous peoples such as the Eyak of Cordova, Alaska, whose close relationships with octopuses offer unique insight into the intriguing creatures. Nevertheless, Scheel still has ample space for lengthy discussions of octopus behaviour and physiology, sharing details and anecdotes that vicariously convey his deep, passionate fascination with octopuses. Even the gaps in our knowledge about these animals become compelling in Scheel’s hands – his musings on the true extents of their size or cognition have an infectious enthusiasm that makes it difficult not to drop everything and immediately take up marine biology.

Where the book falters slightly is in its structure. Scheel’s writing is often meandering and discursive, which is both a blessing and a curse. His ability to drift between tangentially related topics allows him to paint a much broader picture of the undersea world of octopuses, contextualising their places within both animal and human ecosystems. It also unfortunately limits the conclusions the book can reach – if you go into nonfiction looking for definitive thesis statements, you might be out of luck here. Nevertheless, such an amorphous approach is almost appropriate for a book about octopuses, defined as they are by their shifting colours and flowing movement: as the title implies, octopuses are Many Things Under a Rock.