Bishop Hill Eaten: A novel
Nov 17, 2015 Books Climate: Sceptics 
Susan Crockford has written a novel about people being eaten by polar bears. Here's what she has to say about it.
This is a polar bear attack thriller. What Jaws did for the beaches of New England, Eaten does for northern Newfoundland. Terror and carnage abound as hungry polar bears come ashore in droves seeking any food available, including human prey.
Set in the year 2025 at the edge of the Arctic, the story considers future possibilities no one has yet contemplated. In this tale, the occupants of hundreds of small towns and isolated outports spread across northern Newfoundland are quite unprepared for an early spring onslaught of hungry polar bears. People haven’t just been killed, they’ve been eaten. As the attacks multiply, people find they are not safe even in their own homes.
Local residents, Mounties, and biologists struggle with a disturbing new reality: they have a huge polar bear problem on their hands, and if they don’t find a solution quickly, dozens more people will die gruesome deaths, and hundreds more polar bears will be shot.
A Newfoundland seal biologist gets help from an expat Alaskan carnivore specialist as they team up with officers of the Royal Canadian Mounted Police to address the threat. Stopping the carnage and the relentless terror will be the biggest challenge they’ve ever faced as they struggle to prevent this from being the most horrifying disaster in Newfoundland's history.
From science to science fiction?
I'm a scientist but I grew up in a family of storytellers and avid fiction readers. When it was clear the time had come to try my hand at writing a novel, it felt like a logical progression from science writing, not a leap. Starting with polar bears just felt right.
And here’s why: for years, polar bear specialists have being playing “what-if”. They’ve used computer models to predict polar bear responses to computer-predicted sea ice conditions 25-90 years into the future and insist their prophecies will become reality unless human behaviour changes. They like to call their "what-if" science.
I decided to play too – except I call my “what-if” a novel.
Arguably climate science fiction with a twist, some call this genre “speculative fiction” or “technothriller.” I’ve included a “recommended reading” list at the end of the book for those who want to follow up on the science background but the book is primarily for readers who prefer their science “lite” and those who love a good story.
See the YouTube book trailer.
More detail and links here.
The paperback is ready to order and will ship as soon as the books are printed; the ebooks are available for pre-order and will download November 30, 2015. Price for the paperback is US$14.49; for the ebooks US$6.99
Here's where to buy it:
(Temporary Kindle links, until Amazon gets it linked to the paperback)
- ePub version (via Smashwords, which ships to Apple, Barnes & Noble, and Kobo), see
LIMITED TIME OFFER for the ePub version: November 30, 2015 until December 3, 2015 only
FREE with promotion code GW98Q (not case-sensitive)
Reader Comments (14)
A Crockford of what bears do in the woods?
Tacit acknowledgement that it's all just fiction is at least acknowledgement that the whole "polar bear vs sea ice" narrative is all just fiction. I would agree with Susan, it's progress.
http://polarbearscience.com/2015/11/05/who-tagged-the-beaufort-sea-polar-bear-with-the-tight-collar/
Also from Susan's blog just a few days previously we find the article and photo linked above.
All over the world creatures great and small are increasingly being manhandled and aggressively interfered with by a flood of incompetent graduates produced by universities for no apparent reason other than the self aggrandizement of professors in ivory towers.
For goodness sake, leave them alone you cretins!
It is clear that we must shoot all polar bears before 2020. Before they eat all our children and grandchildren
Just ordered the paperback from Amazon uk. Should make good reading for me and for visitors if this winter turns out to be cold and long with lots of snow.
Polar Bears are apex predators, that means they regard everything else , included other polar bears , has potential food. They have and will seek out humans as a food source , indeed they been known to following humans for 'days' in hunting them . It needs no 'climate doom' to make them act in this way .
Of course our green friends could prove me wrong given them a 'cuddle ' to show how much they care . After all just like the poor sod who thought they could do the same with grizzly who ended up has bear sh*t, what can go wrong .
Hmm...
a few years back I was in the museum at Longyearbyen on Svalbard looking up close at the stuffed bear there - which is, up close I have to say - a sobering experience - about the size/weight of a small car. The bears prowl the human settlements aroundabouts and many people openly carry large(st) caliber handguns as a consequence of being on the menu....
Gary Larsen comes to mind
knr, don't be stupid, Greens have been trying to portray polar bears as lovely fluffy creatures, that everybody should invite home for a bite to eat, that can then be tucked into bed with the kids at night, to keep monsters away.
"Polar Bears are apex predators, that means they regard everything else , included other polar bears as potential food."
My mother was attacked by a polar bear in a fight over a packet of value frozen horse burgers in Tesco, Paisley. That proves they will eat absolutely anything.
roger
I agree with your sentiments. I was watching something on the box the other night, possibly Country File, which covered Red Kites. The birds had large, probably credit card sized, tags on their wings. Tags in that there were two as far as I could tell. I think one tag represented year of birth and the other location. This has to affect their flying abilities as they were placed at the leading edge of the wing (radio tags are already regarded as problematical). The large size was to make life easy for the researchers with little regard to the bird's well-being.
esmiff
I've seen some strange things in Tesco stores in Scotland and don't doubt your mother's experience.
@SandyS: The tags used on Red Kites only weigh a few grams and are highly flexible, they have been in use on birds across England, Wales, Scotland and Ireland for over two decades, without any observable ill-effects.
Your comments that they "affect their flying abilities" and have "little regard to the bird's well-being" are as ignorant and scientifically unfounded as the whole concept of AGW.
They have not only been essential in monitoring the population dynamics of Red Kites in the UK; but, as I can professionally attest, have provided key evidence in the successful prosecution of a number of farmers and game-keepers involved in the deliberate poisoning of these wonderful raptors.
In Iceland they kill any polar bears that come ashore off the ice (or so I've read).
Polar bears by the sea - so it's pier reviewed!
OK, OK I'll get my hat.