Richard J. King

Richard J. King is an author and illustrator. Most recently, he wrote the nonfiction books Ahab's Rolling Sea: A Natural History of Moby-Dick, lauded in Science, Nature, and American Scholar. He is also the author of Lobster, which was acclaimed by the New York Times and The Wall Street Journal,and The Devil's Cormorant: A Natural History, which was short-listed for the ASLE Creative Book Award and rated as one of the top five science books of 2013 by Library Journal. His current projects continue to explore the history of our relationship with marine life and the sea in a forthcoming illustrated collection of bite-sized environmental histories of ocean animals, titled An Ocean Bestiary (Chicago, 2023), and in a history of singlehanded mariners and the blue environmental movement, to be titled Sailing Alone (Penguin UK, 2024). He has been sailing on tall ships for over twenty-five years; when he is not at sea, he lives in Santa Cruz, California.