The nutshell: For years, University of Colorado–Boulder and Vermilion Sea Institute biologist Hirsh has brought a class of college students to Baja California to study the ecology and history of the Sea of Cortez. He chronicles one summer’s adventures in teaching and offers ruminations on changing ecosystems and sea cucumbers, the evolution of domestic dogs and the development of Mexico.

Literary lovechild of: Barry Lopez’s Arctic Dreams and Frank McCourt’s Teacher Man.

You’ll find it on your bookshelf if: A C-minus in freshman biology quashed your dreams of doing a semester on a boat. And of going to medical school. And of marrying the one person you ever loved. But you’re still more upset about that semester-on-a-boat thing.

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