Additional information
by Howard Steven Pines (Author)
The Whale Song Translation is a story about sound―sounds of language, sounds of songs, and the sounds that kill . . . When the Navy's controversial sonar experiments begin to destroy Maui's whales, an unlikely hero emerges. Inspired by his mentor's paradigm-busting challenge to open a communications channel with other big-brained species, acoustics professor David Dmitri begins analyzing the songs of humpback whales. The quest to decode their mysterious language leads him to an astonishing revelation. With more proof, Dmitri realizes he could rally public opinion and stanch the bloodshed. But as his team prepares to launch a voyage of discovery in the Straits of Lahaina, others are determined to stop him-whatever the consequences. In the spirit of Carl Sagan's Contact and Steven Spielberg's Close Encounters, The Whale Song Translation is a voyage of discovery into a new frontier: the excitement of first contact and the recognition of the intelligence, dignity, and wisdom of another earthly species. Built on fascinating, believable science, Part I of The Torch of Prometheus trilogy delivers thought-provoking "breakthroughs" about language and intelligence in earth's other big-brained beings, and explores the intertwined existential crises of humans and whales.
Author Biography
The moment I realized computers could solve math problems at the "speed of light," I was hooked. My career passion for software engineering began during the seventies energy crisis as an alternative energy research scientist at the Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory. However, it wasn't until I'd joined a startup company specializing in digital voice products that I discovered my true calling. My writing is informed by a twenty-five-year Silicon Valley software engineering career that's led to five patents in wireless voice technology. In the adaptation of voice and modem algorithms for communication devices, I became fascinated by the theoretical and physical foundations of speech. I was amazed to recognize the connection between the natural process that created spoken language and the design of cell phone technology-they had both found the solution predicted by a fundamental law of communications. The realization of this convergence is the inspiration for my fictional trilogy-in-progress, The Torch of Prometheus. The Whale Song Translation is the first installment of the trilogy. The idea for the book's "Speakeasy" speech-therapy system is based on a speech-modulated, shape-writing prototype I developed and demonstrated at the Fremont campus of the California School for the Deaf in 1985. My understanding that human speech evolved into a process of shape-writing and shape-matching generated the interspecies communication experiment at the core of the novel. To learn more about the underlying principles common to speech, language, and whale songs and, if my time permits, maybe even a demo of the shape-writing app featured in the book, visit www.HowardStevenPines.com. This book's inspiration was spawned the moment I first thrilled to a humpback rocketing from the deep blue sea. I was ultimately compelled to tell this story when, during a "recreational" analysis session of a humpback whale song recording, I grokked the intriguing implications of waveforms eerily similar to frequency-modulated human speech. Born in Los Angeles and a lifelong Californian, I have a love affair with the Pacific Ocean that is steeped in childhood summers playing in the waves. Entranced by Northern California's coastline, beaches, and migrating whales, I currently shuttle between the scenic bay and coastal communities of El Cerrito and Mendocino. Maui is a favorite vacation getaway destination, and the inspirational setting of my debut novel and its forthcoming sequel.
