Raising the (Carbon) Curtain!
The longest gestation period of any land animal is that of the African elephant at 22 months. Pretty impressive, but the frilled shark evidently hauls around its offspring-to-be for 42 months. And a deep-sea octopus was found to be guarding her clutch of eggs for 4½ years. When it comes to the time from inception to birth, there are a fair number of authors who’ve incubated books for significantly longer than elephants, sharks or octopi gestate their offspring. Junot Díaz'
