Author Doreen Cunningham's beautiful volume is a luminous depiction of an epic grey whale migration and an intensely powerful memoir of reclaiming a life battered by poverty and isolation. It is a shining testament to the healing properties of the natural world. Soundings is the story of a woman reclaiming her life, a child growing to love an ocean that is profoundly endangered, and a mother learning from another species how to parent in a time of unprecedented change.