Confrontations between Japanese whalers and Sea Shepherd activists make for exciting news reports during the Australian summer. But the sensational headlines and dramatic footage - eco warriors pitted against the might of the Japanese state - fail to scratch the surface of the complex forces that drive each side's actions. In Blood and Guts, Sam Vincent provides an objective eyewitness account of the whale wars. What motivates Sea Shepherd to spend vast sums of money and risk the lives of its activists to pursue a relatively low-impact hunt in some of the most isolated and perilous waters on Earth? Why does a rich nation like Japan doggedly continue a practice it only started to feed its starving population in the wake of World War II? While the International Court of Justice has recently upheld Australia's claim that Japan must stop its 'research' whaling in the Southern Ocean, Japan is already planning to resume its whale hunt in 2015. Australia might have won the battle, but the whale wars seem set to continue. Blood and Guts is a vivid and definitive work of reportage that gets to the heart of this divisive issue.
Author Biography
Sam Vincent is a freelance travel writer and investigative journalist. He is a regular contributor to the Sydney Morning Herald and the Age and has a degree in international relations from the Australian National University. He has been published in the Monthly and the Griffith Review. When not travelling, he works as a researcher and editor at the Australia and New Zealand School of Government.
