Coves of Departure: Field Notes from the Sea of Cortez is a literary natural history presented in mixed forms of nature memoir, personal essay and redacted field notes. Intended as narrative nonfiction for general readership, it focusses on the natural history of Mexico’s Baja California peninsula, attending especially to the littoral zone of the Sea of Cortez. Numbered chapters narrate several sea kayak expeditions led by the author to the Isla Espiritu Santo archipelago of Baja California Sur. Chapters chronicling discrete expeditions are sectioned off by two long interludes that describe natural history explorations in the northern state, Baja California. The title essay, which transitions between the second interlude and the final chapter, investigates natural history from the perspective of material ecocriticism,.