Product Description

A brilliant mix of vivid reportage, history and science. Historical diving bells, greek sponge divers, world war two frogmen and record-setting breath hold divers compete for space with misunderstood sharks, weeping turtles, smiling dolphins and erotically shaped sea slugs. From Ireland to Florida, Papua New Guinea to Vienna and the Bahamas to Seychelles, Neutral Buoyancy is travel writing of the most fascinating, readable kind; providing a window - or a view from a glass bottomed boat - on a rich, unfamiliar and unique destination. Travel writing of this quality makes Neutral Buoyancy a must for all armchair travellers, not just divers.

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #10610 in Books
• Published on: 2002-05-30
• Original language: English
• Binding: Paperback
• 368 pages

Amazon.co.uk Review
In Neutral Buoyancy, BBC journalist Tim Ecott recounts his ongoing adventures in the "liquid world" of scuba diving--from battling rip-tides off the Dorset coast to exploring the shark-rich waters of the Caribbean--musing along the way on the history and meaning of man's fascination with diving, and reflecting on how his underwater experience has reshaped his life.

Four days after my mother's funeral I went scuba diving for the first time ... Surfacing from a dive ... I often think it strange that this mind-cleansing, emotionally charged experience is one that my mother never knew I had. It is something akin to the sense of regret I feel that she never met my daughter, born a few years after her passing. How odd that something so wonderful was not part of our shared experience.

The launch hype surrounding this book pushed it as scuba diving's answer to Nick Hornby's bestselling homage to football fandom, Fever Pitch, but even allowing for a hearty dose of wishful thinking on the publisher's part, there are two key similarities. Ecott, like Hornby, succeeds in explaining his passion in a way that speaks directly to the wannabe or even to the merely curious--lightly humorous; strong on characters; cross-references to popular culture (James Bond puts in an appearance); natural history in the TV prime-time style, rooted in personal experience. And just as Hornby's football fandom carries him back to the same sense of wonder and certainty of purpose that intoxicated him as a young boy, so Ecott portrays a link between diving and dissolving the anxieties and fearfulness of adulthood.

Be warned: if you are already a diver, Neutral Buoyancy will heighten the sense that you are wasting far too much precious time on dry land. For the rest, even if the last time you ventured underwater was in the bath, this inspirational book will have you contemplating a trip to your local swimming pool at the very least. --Alex Hankin

Review
This is described on the cover as the 'Fever Pitch of scuba diving', and one can only hope that this means that every possible sport has now found its Nick Hornby. As for scuba, while this book lacks the football equivalent's charm and humour, it makes up for it in its robust scholarship and lyrical prose. Ecott is in love with diving and he wants us to be too. He is fascinated by its history, from the Greek sponge divers, through to Edmund Halley's exploits in Pagham harbour, as much as he is drawn to comets, and Jacques Cousteau, who brought scuba diving to the masses in the 1960s with his enthusiasm and ludicrous accent. And interspersed with all this is the author's own experiences. He comes across as the wise old bird on the beach, hair bleached, at ease with his scuba gear, telling stories of past dives and escapades in faraway lands. And thus he can verge on the hippy - in love with the weird world below the waves, aware that we're not supposed to be there, and occassionally justifying it all with some cod philosophy. His enthusiasm wins through and we're left with an engaging account of a pursuit that seems more like a calling. (Kirkus UK)

From the Publisher
Tony Parsons and Fergal Keane praise Neutral Buoyancy
"This is wonderfully engaging book. It took a subject I knew next to nothing about and kept me gripped from beginning to end. Tim Ecott has produced an eccentric, eclectic and highly readable work of non-fiction." Fergal Keane

"Unforgettable stuff ... Neutral Buoyancy is destined to become the Fever Pitch of scuba diving. Tim Ecott's book is a modern classic about the underwater world that brilliantly mixes personal memoir with travel, history and a cast of characters that defy description ... vivid,lyrical and quite brilliantly written" Tony Parsons