Santa Barbara’s own polar explorer Bruce Luyendyk has a new memoir “Mighty Bad Land, A Perilous Expedition to Antarctica Reveal Clues to an Eighth Continent” that covers his first expedition to Marie Byrd Land in Antarctica.

Luyendyk will be at Chaucer’s Book for a book signing, 6-7 p.m. June 7 at 3321 State St., Santa Barbara.

In his writings about Antarctica, geologist Luyendyk embeds readers with his team of six as they face the elements, make discoveries, and work 800 miles from the next outpost.

As the expedition’s leader, Luyendyk successfully faces up to his demons that surface under the duress of the polar experience, including nearly losing two team members.

Like scientific efforts in general, Luyendyk’s resulted in surprises. Through evaluating their discoveries, he realized that huge submarine plateaus in the southwest Pacific, including New Zealand, are continental pieces that broke away from the Antarctic sector of Gondwana.

The story fills a gap in the time of Antarctic exploration, between the heroic age; the military exploration age; and before the modern age of science on the continent with GPS, satellite phones and the Internet.

Luyendyk coined the term Zealandia to describe this new continent that only the top of its mountains reveals the nation of New Zealand. The area comprises a submerged continent, a stunning revelation with economic and geopolitical consequences.

In 2016, the mountain where the team camped was renamed Mount Luyendyk in his honor.

Luyendyk, a distinguished professor emeritus from UCSB, was elected a Fellow of the Geological Society of America, the American Geophysical Union, and the American Association for the Advancement of Science.

In 2016, the U.S. Board on Geographic Names honored him by naming summit 1070 in Antarctica Mount Luyendyk.

Luyendyk’s prior research in marine geophysics included the exploration of deep-sea black smokers, i.e. hydrothermal vents, using the deep submersible ALVIN off western Mexico. For this, he and colleagues shared the Newcomb Cleveland Prize of the American Association for the Advancement of Science.

“Mighty Bad Land,” published by Permuted Press and distributed by Simon & Schuster, will be released on May 30.

For more, visit https://bruceluyendyk.com.