'Orca' Explores Extinction Crisis Facing Pacific Northwest Whales

In 2018, science journalist Lynda Mapes drew international attention for her day-by-day coverage of the female orca known as “Tahlequah,” who carried her dead newborn calf more than 1000 miles through the Salish Sea before finally letting her go. That reporting formed the basis for Mapes’s newest book “Orca: Shared Waters, Shared Home,” which explores the sophisticated social networks that orcas form and the environmental threats that are driving them to extinction.