Overfishing is an obvious threat to our capacity to feed ourselves.

I wanted to be a writer all my life. Since I was 10. And then at a certain point I began to assume I was one, which is rich, I know. I didn't meet a writer until I was nearly an adult, so I had no idea what I'd bet the farm on.

Yet however comforting and peaceful beach-combing is, it ends up like the sea, as disturbing as it is reassuring. In dark moments I believe that walking on a beach at low tide is to be looking for death, or at least anticipating it. You will only find the dead, the spilled and the cast-off. Things torn free of their life or their place.

People do change - individuals, families, nations - and the pace of transformation need not be geological.

What I'm saying so badly is we're bred now to believe we're in control and should be in control.

People can make symbolic gestures but doesn't mean their life changes. One philanthropic moment doesn't make a life of renewal; of change.

The ocean is a supreme metaphor for change. I expect the unexpected but am never fully prepared.