Deep Waters

“With love as rugged and wild as the Alaskan landscape she made home, biologist Beth Ann Mathews tells the story of another wilderness: marriage after a life-altering stroke. Deep Waters is a thoughtful and provoking read, a reminder that life and love are inexplicably fragile and resilient, full of unexpected discovery.”—ABBY MASLIN, author of Love You Hard

“… a love story that comes at the reader with the gloves off and goes a full twelve rounds.”—LYNN SCHOOLER, critically acclaimed author of The Blue Bear and Walking Home

“Urgent, informative, emotionally satisfying, and thought-provoking, Deep Waters opens with a harrowing medical mystery and rewards the reader with a loving account of an adventurous partnership made stronger by crisis.”—ANDROMEDA ROMANO-LAX, author of Annie and the Wolves“Mathews writes with poignant honesty about the challenges of marriage, family, and community in a moving story that highlights the strengths of human relationships. Deep Waters starts with a bang and just keeps going—lively, vivid, and personal.” —ROMAN DIAL, author of The Adventurer’s Son: A Memoir “If books were birds, this one would be an arctic tern—powerful and graceful, beset by storms and learning to survive, and more, to thrive. The writing is feather-light yet strong.” —KIM HEACOX, author of Jimmy Bluefeather“… a survival story of the highest order, navigating the complex terrain of marriage, medical crisis, and a future reimagined.”—CAROLINE VAN HEMERT, award-winning author of The Sun is a Compass“… an incisive, smartly informative memoir that celebrates the power of the cohesive family unit—its outcome will offer positivity and hope to those facing similar challenges.”—Kirkus Reviews“Poignant, profound, and powerful.” — MARV JENSEN, Superintendent of Glacier Bay National Park 1988-199“We felt like we were there with Beth, sharing her emotions, anguish and struggles through the stroke, hospital stay, and recovery. We felt like part of the family as we read, gasped, cried and hoped for recovery and for peace in her heart.”—TBD BOOK CLUB, Seattle, WA

Beth Mathews earned her master’s degree in marine biology from the University of California at Santa Cruz. As a professor at the University of Alaska Southeast, she taught courses in biology, behavioral ecology, and marine mammalogy and led research on harbor seals, Steller sea lions, and harbor porpoises. She has also studied humpback, gray, and sperm whales and—briefly—sleeper sharks, and led undergraduate research programs on board tall ships in the Gulf of Maine and from field camps in Hawaii and Alaska. She has published numerous scientific papers, and a chapter from Deep Waters placed second in the 2018 Redwood Writers Memoir Contest. Deep Waters is Mathews’s first book. She lives on an island with her husband in Puget Sound, WA.