Our seas are host to an extraordinary variety of plant and animal life, but much of it remains mysterious and great imagery is surprisingly hard to find.

Alex Mustard is one of the world's leading underwater photographers and his images are so crisp and immediate that the animals seem to swim out of the water towards you. This beautiful book gathers together a selection of his award-winning images and a number of new ones to create a vivid picture of the seas and oceans and the animals that inhabit them, each chapter accompanied by a 1500 word essay and extended captions written by leading natural history writer, Professor Callum Roberts.

The text addresses the issue of change in the oceans along with tales of oceanography, marine life and human history in the seas and aims to help the reader to get to know the oceans, understand how marine animals live their lives and how they have, are and may well adapt to change.