www.seaofsuddens.org

About Sea of Suddens

Our planet, our home, with all of its intricate, delicately balanced systems, is the accidental casualty of humanity's success as toolmakers. In the beginning the objective of our labors, to reduce suffering and eliminate risk, was an essential one. Then came the unexpected consequences. Climate change, resource depletion, impoverishment at an unimaginable scale. Sea of Suddens is an allegory for this human dilemma.

This book employs a compelling fictional world to carry a timely message. A work of discovery, this thirty two page picture book relies upon beauty to invite ownership of solution. It provides a means to understand that actions, at any scale, individual or societal, can produce not only devastating ramifications, but beautiful remedies.

Once the accidental outcome is discovered what must we do to address it?

In the Sea of Suddens, a group of garden dwelling friends find themselves the casual victims of actions far removed from where they live. Compelled to understand and deal with the source of their suffering they lovingly engage the problem in order to restore their world. If and how to adapt to critical challenges is a question facing both our fictional characters and humanity as a whole. Choosing resolution over blame, asking what needs to be done and seeking a way to do it are the lessons of this metaphoric tale. An urgent sense of immediacy inhabits the hearts of these characters. Our homily is intended to establish a space for considered, joyful reflection on the central question of our time- climate change. 

By joining mature readers and young listeners the Sea of Suddens creates opportunities for just such a deliberate, gentle engagement with an understanding of how problems are perceived and met.

The environment of this book is parallel to the world in which the book itself exists.  As a teaching tool, a didactic introduction to questions of whole systems integrity and applied solutions, Sea of Suddens is a nurturing guide. When it comes to illustrating the nature of questioning, the value of curiosity, and the power of love to resolve, to move, these characters are strongly persuasive.

The manner in which language and image convey this story is designed to transcend cultural barriers. Image informs language, language articulated as image, completes this circle. This world is only complete and fully conveyed by words and images working in tandem, complimenting each other.

We stand in a Guttenberg moment. An instant in which a quality, affordable object, translatable across all cultures and released from the historic constraints of physicality, can tell a meaningful story to a global audience. This is a story of and for its time. The tale of climate change.

Technology can free knowledge from the confines of privilege; computers allow this story to be told in every remote earthly corner where stars shine over clay courtyards, frozen square, or village green. Electrons flow, words and images sail out, touching countless readers clustered in tens and twenties around solar powered computer screens from Zambia to Tunisia.

As to scope, our ambition is to deliver this allegory to our global community. We intend a special focus on impoverished, vulnerable places most likely to suffer the early effects of climate chaos. Placing this story in the electronic distribution network ensures the widest possible reach. This is not a mere picture book. We are currently developing a variety of forms and formats for the story that will permit adaptation to e books, three dimensional teaching tools and motion graphics in order that no barrier to access be left intact.

Our particular focus is to engage young people and establish a permanent home for this inquiry; a place guaranteed by its nature to be free from the contaminating trivialities that distract us from the pursuit of vital solutions. Our desire is to incite understanding, excite curiosity and spark imagination in readers of all ages.  Ensuring that increased involvement and heightened status attach to this essential human endeavor is key.