For more than two decades, Ray Troll has been luring, hooking, and landing fans around the world with his zany, irreverent, and often surreal art. Featured in museums, galleries, and books, as well as on immensely popular T-shirts, his work — part natural history adventure and part underground comic — depicts beautiful and accurately drawn fish of all kinds, Northwest Coast totems, Freud and Darwin, fossils, resurrections of extinct animals, and much more.

Rapture of the Deep collects some of Troll's best-known art along with many images never before published. The book makes powerful connections between biological diversity, the evolution of life on earth, and the careless habits of people. Rapture of the Deep celebrates Troll's vision with legendary works including "Spawn Till You Die," "Life's a Fish and Then You Fry," and "Bassackwards," in which fish use money, liquor, and literature as bait to lure humans. Troll's running commentary reveals the thought and inspiration behind his art. Writer Brad Matsen, Troll's longtime coconspirator, adds a lively introduction to the art and life of his "sole" brother.

"Alaska artist Troll's knack for making intricate, playful drawings of all things fishy has led to an empire of books, magazine illustrations, museum shows, gallery displays and decorated t-shirts. This large-sized, full-color volume presents an overview of Troll's drawings, complete with commentary by the artist. Some of the pieces are amusingly tongue-in-cheek ('Rebel with a Cod,' 'Weapons of Bass Destruction,' 'The Lucky Fish Gets the Cheeseburger'), while others are beautifully surrealistic. But the most impressive are his grandly composed fish-scapes ('Fishes of the Amazon,' 'Bottom Fish of the North Pacific,' 'A Ratfish Called Troll'), in which layers of perfectly-detailed fish are arranged into brilliant panoramas. Matsen's lively introduction provides lots of useful information about Troll's life and aesthetic leanings, making this a must-have book for any serious fan of the artist." Publishers Weekly (Copyright Reed Business Information, Inc.)

"'Fish worship, is it wrong?' Clearly it is not in this marvelous book that assembles the largest collection by far of the art of Ray Troll. The wide and wildly creative landscape of Troll's talent is in full view here."--John G. Lundberg, The Academy of Natural Sciences, Philadelphia

"I love this book. RayTroll's art reflects a seductive merging of marine biologist, circuit-riding preacher, anarcho-syndicalist, and fish processor. Ray is a man who not only is in touch with his unconscious, he has also made friends with it and appears to periodically take it out for a burger, chocolate malt, and large fries."--Milton Love, Marine Science Institute, University of California, Santa Barbara

"A wonderful book. . . . "Rapture of the Deep "sneaks a wealth of wisdom about art, nature, and the human condition into a package that will delight people from every walk of life."--Kesler Woodward, artist and Professor of Art Emeritus at the University of Alaska, Fairbanks

In addition to celebrating the extraordinary fish artist, this beautiful book also pays tribute to the world of zoological and anthropological creatures he renders with a blend of biological accuracy and surreal, offbeat humor.