The Drowned Places

Author Damian Le Bas
Narrator Damian Le Bas
Publisher Random House
Publish Date 17 April 2025
Run Time 9 hours and 53 minutes
Format Audio
Genre Ancient Greek religion and mythology, Autobiography: adventurers and explorers, Memoirs, Swimming and diving, The Earth: natural history: general interest, The environment, Travel writing.

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What to expect

Brought to you by Penguin.

Entranced by history and myth, captivated by the wonders of nature, Damian Le Bas explores the meaning we find in sunken ruins around the world

Thousands of years ago, an island off the Straits of Gibraltar went to war with Athens. The battle was lost, and overnight the island sank beneath the waves – or so legend tells.

As a boy, Damian Le Bas was captivated by the story of Atlantis. As an adult, he dreams of diving to discover its ruins. After the death of his father, torn between his lifelong desire and the taboo Romany culture places on the ocean, he comes across a dive shop. He can’t help but go in.

Under the waves, Damian enters a breathtaking world. As he masters the skills of this exhilarating sport, diving with seals in the Farne Islands, exploring submerged Roman ruins in Naples and mapping the sunken city of Port Royal, he is entranced by wonders both man-made and natural.

Plato's writings on Atlantis were a parable about the hubris of humankind; in witnessing our effects on oceans and ocean communities, Damian finds echoes of this in the modern world.

A spellbinding love letter to diving, The Drowned Places is also a profound examination of the power that myth has over us, and what happens when it crosses over into reality.

'The most compelling and evocative of underwater odysseys' KATE HUMBLE
'Breathtakingly good' TRISTAN GOOLEY
'The most captivating book on diving that I have ever read' MENSUN BOUND

© Damian Le Bas 2025 (P) Penguin Audio 2025

Critics Review

Beautifully writtenu2026The Drowned Places is one of the best books on diving that I have ever read

Literary Review

Le Bas is a fine, vivid writeru2026 I've read few better descriptions of the contradictions of the sport, its wonder and its terror, its grace and its absurdity

Sunday Telegraph

A very good book. THE book about diving I couldnu2019t find a few years ago: giving both the technicalities and the wonder

AMY LIPTROT

Le Bas goes on a compelling dual journey in this book, both historical and personal. His curiosity brings the ancient myths and stark realities of the ocean vividly to life. A various, rich exploration

SOPHIE ELMHIRST, author of Maurice and Maralyn

I loved this book - a wonderful interweaving of diving and exploration with coming to terms with grief, beautifully written and endlessly fascinating. One of the best books that I have read in a long time

DAVID GIBBINS, author of A History of the World in Twelve Shipwrecks

Beautiful and thought provoking

TLS

[Le Bas] writes well about grief, finding rich metaphors in each submarine landscape

Spectator

Loss, risk, adventure and redemption. Le Bas has written the most compelling and evocative of underwater odysseys

KATE HUMBLE, author of A Year of Living Simply

An enthralling exploration of the liminal by one of the most exciting writers around. A breathtakingly good book

TRISTAN GOOLEY, author of How to Read a Tree

The most captivating book on diving that I have ever read. But it is not about diving as a sport; it is about diving as an accessway to submerged landscapes, the festival of life that inhabits them and, above all, the drowned ruins of lost civilisations

MENSUN BOUND, author of The Ship Beneath the Ice

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