Ever wondered what kind of crazy creatures you would find in each continent of the world? Marty Essen wondered this after a trip to Belize with his wife, Deb, which led him to the publishing of his nationally award winning book, Cool Creatures, Hot Planet: Exploring the Seven Continents.
On Sept. 29, on the south bridge, one might have seen Marty Essen performing his show, Around the World in 50 Minutes, which is the multi-media version of Essen’s book. Essen has been performing this show at colleges, zoos, museums and other venues since the release of his book.
Cool Creatures, Hot Planet: Exploring the Seven Continents is about the travel of Marty and Deb Essen visiting each individual continent in search of rare and interesting wildlife. After each travel, Essen says that he would write a chapter.
"One of my biggest fears was that we would have a boring trip, which would lead to a boring chapter," said Essen. "Luckily, something magical happened on every trip like being surrounded by wolves in Canada or stalking Spanish ibex in Spain."
Essen says that he had originally not planned on writing a book, but that it just sort of happened. After visiting the Amazon River and Rainforest, he had published a newspaper article in a couple of local newspapers and they were a huge hit. This inspired Essen and his wife to visit a few more places, and he soon discovered that no one else had written a book on the concept of finding rare wildlife in all seven continents.
Essen says that it was the best decision he’s ever made considering that Cool Creatures, Hot Planet is now an internationally published book that has won six National awards including National Indie Excellence 2007 Book Award for Travel/Essay, 2007 Benjamin Franklin Award for Travel/Essay and the 2009 Green Book Festival Award for Animals, to name a few.
Now that Essen has visited all seven continents and written an award winning book, he plans on continuing to perform his show, Around the World in 50 Minutes, across the country.
In addition to this, Essen is going to be guest hosting a trip to Botswana, Africa for the Oglebay’s Good Zoo of Wheeling, W. Va. sometime in 2010 and advises anyone interested in this trip to contact him at Marty@CoolCreaturesHotPlanet.com for more information.
For more information, photos, tours, and to purchase Essen’s book, Cold Creatures, Hot Planet, visit http://www.CoolCreaturesHotPlanet.com.