Delphys Rising by Kip Koelsch follows on from the author’s first book, Wendall’s Lullaby, and tells the story of one man’s determination and obsession to communicate with dolphins. It has always been known that dolphins are highly intelligent and that they communicate with one another via clicks and high-pitched noises, but can humans decipher these sounds, and can they respond so that the dolphins understand? Bee is a dolphin who may just be able to do that. Hans is a nine-year-old who can identify the dolphins through their sound and Dr. Evan McMillon might just have invented a means to perfect the communication with Delphys. But other forces are at work, and ghosts from his past seem determined to destroy his life’s work.
The author has crafted an amazing scenario that seems all the more plausible because of his skillful and knowledgeable writing. The characters all come across as authentic and credible, and the whole scenario leads the reader to believe that such a center exists. The setting is in Tortola, and the writer describes the scene perfectly which transports the reader to the dolphin world. I have not read the first book by Kip Koelsch, but Delphys Rising is a stand-alone book and it did not deter me from enjoying and relating to the story. It certainly encourages the reader to pick up the first book to relate to the origin of the story and to the transition of Dr. Evan McMillon. The writing and the dialogue flow well, making this an enjoyable read from the start. An author to watch.
–Reader’s Favorite, 2019
FOR MILLENNIA HUMANS HAVE DREAMED OF SPEAKING WITH DOLPHINS AND FAILED.
My shirt was saturated–dampness from the fog mixed with the moist, foul breath of The Apocalypse closing in. I was almost to the stoplight at Pinehurst Road–my turnaround point–and contrary to a typical morning the sky became claustrophobically darker.
Many of you know the adventure we’ve been through over the last three years to reduce/stop the junk mail that had been inundating my 86-year old father. At one point he was receiving up to 100 pieces of mail a day and often was duped into making donations to some very questionable “charities” and other organizations. In addition to having all his mail directed to our home, we made calls, sent emails, mailed letters and sent messages on Facebook to over 800 of these groups to remove him from their mailing lists. While the mail has not completely stopped, we now only receive 1-6 pieces of junk mail for him a day at our home.
“In Koelsch’s imaginative, plausible suspense novel, scientists around the world are baffled when hundreds of dolphins beach themselves in Texas, Virginia, and Mozambique, numbers far greater than ever previously observed.”
I can’t speak for every author, but as a relatively new fiction author there are only a few things that I’d really love to receive as gifts this holiday season.
I cried in the woods today.
This is more of a quick RANT than a reasoned blog post as I deal with another scammer trying to dupe my father from his mailbox. Yes, The Amazing Kreskin managed to find him at his new address and send him his deceptive, elder-baiting junk mail.
Like so many of these scam mailings there is no contact information in their materials–just a return envelope for your check or credit card number. And, lucky for me, I managed to intercept this crap before that return envelope was used by my father.
Sometimes when I’m working on my fiction writing it’s so easy to become absorbed in the world you’ve created or, in the case of my current project, the history of the time period in which you are writing, that current events actually seem more distant.
While most wars tend to generate evolutions in defensive designs and offensive weapons technology, the historical timing and global nature of this war saw the rapid production and development of weapons on an industrial scale. Unfortunately, it took some time (if ever) for the tacticians to adjust to the killing power of the new technologies and casualties in single battles were often of a number rarely seen across entire wars.
So, while doing my book research I was struck by how relevant this may be for today–especially since the date for Veteran’s Day in the United States is what many in Europe and the UK refer to (and what our holiday was originally called) as Armistice Day. Our American holiday is typically clarified as a celebration of living veterans–with Memorial Day being the holiday with which we honor those who gave their lives for our country. Yet still, I could not shake the historical link to Armistice Day, the men and women sacrificed and that brief dream of hope.
One of my earliest connections to the marine environment were seashells. From a young age we took frequent vacations to visit my grandparents on Anna Maria Island in Florida. It was a thousand-foot walk to the beach–the Gulf of Mexico–and it was our daily destination. We’d often walk the beach before breakfast and then later spend hours lounging, swimming, reading and sand castle-building.
At that time I also developed a relationship with the owners of a shell shop on Anna Maria Island–when we were there on vacation year after year. I was particularly fond of cowrie shells–most of which were from areas of the Pacific or Indian Oceans. As I focused on these beautiful and uniquely shaped shells, I ordered rarer specimens–not really considering the impact of the methods used or of the demand created for exotics. I think at some point I realized they were being collected as live mollusks–but as a collector realized I was getting the best specimens that way.
When I was old enough (8th grade), I learned to SCUBA dive with my buddy Jackie. He was interested in seeing the fish and I was interested in just about everything else–but mostly living shells. In New Jersey, there wasn’t much that I was interested in collecting. So when we dove there, I observed the fish and crustaceans. But, on my first family vacation to Florida as a certified diver I was looking to get out on a boat and dive–for the fish, for the overall “exotic” experience, but also to see what kind of live mollusks I might discover and collect. On the second, shallower dive of that offshore boat trip I collected two large horse conchs–living creatures.
I realized my long-ago ethical transformation had evolved in a similar manner to Thoreau’s. For several years, Thoreau funded his writing by providing specimens (birds, reptiles and small mammals) for Harvard zoologist Louis Agassiz. Thoreau killed these creatures and only later in life lamented his actions and changed his mindset and refused future requests for specimens. From that point his writing grew even more eco-philosophical in nature as well as more objective–learning the habits and characteristics of living things through patient and careful observation.
Kip Koelsch Author 