This book had a lot of interesting things to it, and it also had its challenges, making it a difficult one to review. I liked the memoir aspect as well as the science, but I didn't always see a link between the two (this isn't a problem, it's just the author was pushing too hard for the connection sometimes). The memoir portions felt like crisp bits of summer childhood, I think they could've been their own book. The eel portions were sometimes less critical of the information they were giving than I would've liked.

I didn't feel the author's anguish about the fate of the eels disappearing, or the fact that humans are the cause of their extinction. The tone was pretty matter of fact, which I found quite irritating.

I did learn a lot about eels though, and I was pointed towards several other interesting sources.