MY OCEANS
An urgent exploration of caring & mothering on a planet in crisis
In a swell of sea-linked essays, Christina Rivera explores the kinship between marine animals, humans, and Earth’s blue womb. Rivera’s investigative questions begin with the toxic burden of her body and spiral out—to a grieving orca, a hunted manta ray, a pregnant sea turtle, a spawning salmon, an “endling” porpoise, and the “mother culture” of sperm whales —as she redefines what it means to mother and defend a collective future. Braiding memoir with embodied climate science, Rivera challenges that it’s not anthropomorphism to feel deep connection to non-human species and proposes that gathering in collective grief is essential amid the sixth mass extinction on Earth. For ecofeminists, fans of Terry Tempest Williams and Rachel Carson—and for anyone who feels themself disintegrate in the presence of the sea—My Oceans offers a timely and wondrous descent into the deep waters of interbeing in which we swim.
"This collection is threaded with wonder, history, and heartache. In My Oceans, motherhood is not sentimentalized but shown as a transformative political power. Masterfully constructed and beautifully written, this book dwells in the depths—not only of oceans but of mourning, awe, anger, and action." —Beth Piatote, Author of The Beadworkers: Stories
Christina Rivera is a Pushcart Prize-winning essayist from Colorado whose girlhood was bordered by coastlines of Pacific Ocean. She is the debut author of MY OCEANS: Essays of Water, Whales, and Women (Northwestern University Press, March 2025) which was longlisted for the Graywolf Press Prize and a finalist for the Siskiyou Prize for New Environmental Literature. Her work has won the John Burroughs Nature Essay Award (the highest annual honor for a creative nonfiction essay on place, science, and the environment) and appeared in Orion, Longreads, The Cut, and Terrain.org, among other places. Christina is so excited to return to Trident for the author series, having filled many pages of journals at those little tables in the cafe in her 20s! You can learn more about Christina and MY OCEANS at www.christinarivera.com or subscribe to her irregular series of blue love notes, MobyBytes on Substack.
