Books Blog : nonfiction, recommended

Zoo Story: Life in the Garden of Captives by Thomas French

lit.fic.reader@evpl — Mon, 09 Aug 2010 17:23:00 GMT

"Eleven elephants. One plane. Hurtling together across the sky." From these opening sentences, I was captivated by this account of the inner workings of zoos, in particular Lowry Park Zoo in Tampa. The author is a Pulitzer Prize-winning reporter and currently a professor of journalism at Indiana University.

There are many elements that combine to make this such an absorbing narrative. Woven throughout the book is discussion of the issues surrounding the pros and cons of holding animals in captivity and the attendant political implications, local and international. The daily challenge of providing for the well-being of the zoo's residents as well as the safety of its human visitors falls on the shoulders of a largely young, poorly paid, and overworked, if dedicated staff. The author intersperses these considerations with the histories of two of the zoo's most celebrated residents: a chimp who has never fully recovered from his separation from the human family that raised him until adolesence, and a stunningly beautiful but ferocious Sumatran tiger. The ultimate fates of these two animals, the "king" and "queen" of the Lowry Park Zoo, are sadly reflective of the shortcomings of institutions housing animals. Finally, a lighter tone is introduced with an amusing comparison of the behavior of the two-legged power brokers of the Tampa area and the zoo's overreaching director with that of the four-legged denizens of the zoo.

This is as enjoyable a nonfiction title as I've read in a long time and I highly recommend it for its thoughtful examination of the complexities of human-animal interactions.

In discussing the dangers of working with animals, the author makes brief reference to the Christmas Day 2007 attack by an escaped tiger at the San Francisco Zoo, resulting in one human death and another serious mauling; and to the horrific killing, in view of a shocked audience, of a trainer by an orca at Orlando's SeaWorld in February, 2010. An excellent article on the SeaWorld tragedy, "The Killer in the Pool" is in the July 2010 issue of Outside magazine, available at Central and North Park libraries, and is also highly recommended.

Remarkable Story of an Owl and His Girl

wag.mado@evpl — Fri, 07 Aug 2009 18:13:00 GMT

Yes, that's the subtitle of the book I just finished. Wesley the Owl is a must for anyone who has ever been in love with an animal. The story is written by Stacey O'Brien, who was a lab assistant at Cal Tech when she adopted a 4-day-old barn owl after he suffered permanent nerve damage and could not survive in the wild.

The story, which spans close to 20 years, is filled with fascinating anecdotes of the relationship that developed between these two sentient beings. O'Brien's education as a biologist helps the reader understand many interesting facts about barn owls, but that does not keep her from falling deeply in love with Wesley. The story has a deeper meaning which is about unconditional love and commitment and is referred to many times in the book as "the way of the owl."

I found this memoir humorous, heartwarming, educational, compassionate, and I had a hard time putting it down. I'll never think of barn owls the same again.

A day after finishing the book, I tuned in to Oprah where she featured a man whose best friend is a Grizzly Bear. That segment was followed by a friendship between an elephant and a dog at the Elephant Sanctuary in Hohenwald Tennessee -- the same place where Evansville's beloved "Bunny" lived out her last few years. Must have been my week for animal relationship stories!

My Land is Dying, by Harry Caudill

Bufkinite@evpl — Wed, 15 Apr 2009 01:38:00 GMT

Why review a 38 year old book? When I spotted this book, I remembered the name Harry Caudill because of his book Night Comes to the Cumberlands. I read that book after reading a chapter about Harry Caudill in a book of essays by Wendell Berry called What Are People For?

Now, I've been an admirer of Wendell Berry for years, and enjoy his writing - and his thoughts - immensely. Like Berry, Caudill (1922-1990) was a person who willingly tied his life to a place - the Kentucky Cumberlands - and he spent his life living and working in that place, and protecting what he found valuable in it. What he found valuable, it turns out, was the landscape, the people, and the culture that the two - put together - formed.

Published in 1971, My Land is Dying is a detailing of the history the exploitation of the Cumberlands' resources - first the virgin forest that blanketed the region, later the coal, and always the people. He details how the collusion of state government with business interests first disenfranchised, then impoverished, and finally drove from the land the vast majority of the inhabitants of the land. Caudill knows what he's talking about; he was a lawyer, and a good one. But he defended the defenseless, and saw time & again how victories at the local level would be reversed by higher level courts in the capital of Frankfort. His narrative of this slow, inexorable death is accompanied by pictures that show the devastation, and he spends time talking about people. Not in the abstract, but real folks with real names, like the widow Ollie Combs, who was arrested on her own land when she delayed miners by laying down in front of bulldozers.

Written 38 years ago, this book's message should be read more urgently today, both because the stakes are higher, and the truths that it speaks are undiminished: "No nation was ever more abundantly endowed with natural beauty than ours. Yet it is clear from this continuing record that no nation has been more heedless of its legacy. And no chapter of that record is uglier or more threatening than the chapter that continues to be written by the mining interests, whether below or on the surface of the land."

This book may be old, but it deserves to be widely read.

Monster of Florence

wag.mado@evpl — Tue, 20 Jan 2009 22:20:00 GMT

Wow! That was what I was saying most of the way through Douglas Preston's bestselling book. To think I wandered around Florence in the dark four years ago without ever knowing of these crimes. It gives me goose-bumps. If you didn't pick it up while it was on the NY Times Best Sellers list last year, it's not too late.

This is a true-life crime story like no other. A serial killer began a killing spree in 1968 murdering young lovers all around the Tuscan countryside. It ended 20 years later with a total of 16 victims. Douglas Preston became fascinated with the story after moving to Florence in 2000, and soon became involved in writing a book about the mystery, after spending countless hours with crime reporter and co-author, Mario Spezi. The tale weaves, twists, zigzags, and finally turns you upside down, when the authors become part of the story itself.

"Monster" has all the hallmarks of a modern work of fiction - mystery, murder, body parts, police corruption, deception, satanic cults, revenge, and madness. Will the real killer be revealed? Preston and Spezi give us a final twist at the end and plenty to think about.

United Artists and Tom Cruise have acquired the movie rights to "Monster of Florence" and we'll see if the movie is as good as this book.