Genre : Natural history, memoir Themes : Seasons, births and death, man and nature, animals, history. Books about intimate natural history appeal to me almost as much as travelogues do. These books usually deal with one person's view of a single place, natural phenomenon or animal and can offer one both a very narrow and a wide view of the subject, often delving deep into history, anthropology, zoology, botany and geology. Others skim along the surface and present us with a glittering snapshot of a place frozen at a point in time. My favourites of this sub-genre of both the memoir and of popular science are The Sound of a Wild Snail Eating by Elisabeth Tova Bailey, The Land of Little Rain by Mary Austin and Desert Solitaire by Edward Abbey. This book is not quite at the level of excellence as those three, but it is enjoyable and makes for a nice, slow read. Cowen began gathering material for his intimate study of the natural history of a bit of edgeland in his home-t...
Bookish expressions of a Bibliophile living in Reykjavík