EMPEROR SEA STRIDER - The Emperor Sea Strider is the largest creature currently inhabiting Darwin IV. A denizen of the 'Amoebic Sea' this magnificent animal walks atop the sea's yielding surface feeding as it moves, shaving off great chunks of sea-matrix with the mouths located in its enormous hollow feet. Something of an enigma, the towering creature's internal structure seems to become more rigid and lightweight as it approaches its crown with the denser leg muscles and pelvis tissue keeping the center of gravity low.

Ships at sea. That was unquestionably the spiritual underpinning of this piece. Writing and illustrating a book about alien animals can be a tight-rope act. On the one hand you want your audience to relate to the creatures, on the other, you don't want the fauna to be pedestrian. Early on, I decided to make the majority of the creatures more or less "readable". But after creating many alien animals that were, in my estimation, not quite as boundary-pushing as I might have wanted, I decided to mix things up and "evolve" one that was pretty outrŽ. I know that I was thinking, at the time, "what would something like a giant, walking mollusk look like?" Here's the answer.