The Last

This is a compilation of the first five ebooks.

Every species that has ever gone extinct was witnessed by someone. A farmer noticed the last flock was smaller. A sailor noticed the beach was empty. A keeper noticed the cage was quiet. Their names are not in the scientific record. Their grief is not catalogued. Their testimony is not preserved.

Until now.

The Last is a series of standalone historical fictions. Each book tells the story of a real extinction - not from the scientist who wrote the paper or the politician who failed to pass the law, but from the person who was there. The keeper who fed the last bird every morning. The fisherman who killed the last breeding pair for a collector. The caretaker who found the body after forty years of daily vigil. The person whose hands were closest to the end.

Every book is grounded in the documented record - real dates, real places, real animals. Where the record is silent, the books create plausible, emotionally truthful fiction. You will never be sure where the science ends and the invention begins.

These are short books. Grief is not verbose.

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BOOKS IN VOLUME ONE

Martha - The Passenger Pigeon

Once, they darkened the sky for days. Flocks of five billion birds, blotting out the sun. Her name was Martha. She died alone in a cage in Cincinnati, September 1, 1914.

Benjamin - The Thylacine

The government paid men to kill them. When there was one left, they passed a law. Fifty-nine days later, he froze to death in his cage. Hobart Zoo, Tasmania, September 7, 1936.

The Auks - The Great Auk

Two fishermen. Two birds. One egg. A dealer in Reykjavík paid them for the skins. One of them crushed the last egg underfoot. Eldey Island, Iceland, June 3, 1844.

Lonesome - The Pinta Island Tortoise

Forty years. Every morning. One man. One tortoise. The whole world watching, and still they couldn't save him. Galápagos, June 24, 2012.

The Whisper - A Human Language

When she dies, the word for the way light hits the river in autumn will die with her. No one else alive knows it.

Each book stands alone. Start anywhere. The series is never-ending - as long as species are disappearing, there are stories to tell.