Bird School: A beginner in the wood by Adam Nicolson
Review by Peter Reason ‘The first time I met a bird close-up, it was dead. A raven.’ From this grab-your-attention first line and the evocative description of this encounter, I…
Light Rains Sometimes Fall: A British Year Through Japan’s 72 Seasons by Lev Parikian
Review by Liz Dexter “For Japan’s lotus blossom, praying mantis and bear, we have bramble, wood louse and urban fox” Lev Parikian, a writer, birdwatcher and conductor, had already started…
The Nightingale: Notes on a songbird, by Sam Lee
Review by Peter Reason Sam Lee is a renowned song collector, interpreter, and singer of folk songs from Britain and Ireland; he has an abiding interest in wilderness studies and…
Wintering: A Season With Geese by Stephen Rutt
Reviewed by Liz Dexter Stephen Rutt and his partner move to Dumfries, to a flat near the Solway Firth, just as he’s finishing writing his first (wonderful) book The Seafarers…
The Birds They Sang: Birds and People in Life and Art by Stanisław Łubieński
Translated from Polish by Bill Johnston Review by Peter Reason Stanisław Łubieński first began observing birds in childhood through Soviet binoculars. Later, he took his hobby to a more serious…
Red Sixty Seven, curated by Kit Jewitt
Review by Peter Reason When I was a small boy, back in the 1950s, I remember going on Sunday School trips to the seaside. Once we were out of London,…
The Seafarers: A Journey Among Birds by Stephen Rutt
Review by Liz Dexter This charming and perceptive book opens with a gut-wrenching account of taking off in a Very Small Plane from Kirkwall in Orkney, travelling to North Ronaldsay….
Birds in the Ancient World by Jeremy Mynott
Review by Liz Dexter Jeremy Mynott is both a classical scholar and a writer on birds, and his love and deep knowledge of both areas shine through in this fascinating…
The Seabird’s Cry: The Lives and Loves of Puffins, Gannets and Other Ocean Voyagers by Adam Nicolson
Review by Peter Reason It is easy for those of us who live inland to read the ‘seabirds’ in the title as ‘seagulls’ and think of those creatures that poo…
Ornithology by Nicholas Royle
Reviewed by Annabel Earlier this year, I reviewed the novel An English Guide to Birdwatching by an author named Nicholas Royle, and I interviewed its author. Ornithology is not by…
Q&A with Nicholas Royle, author of An English Guide to Birdwatching
Interview by Annabel Annabel: Firstly, I apologise, but I must admit, when offered this book for review, I initially mixed you up with the other Nicholas Royle, something you must (both)…
An English Guide to Birdwatching by Nicholas Royle
Review by Annabel When first offered this book to review – I thought it was finally time to get around to reading one of Nicholas Royle’s novels, I’ve several on…
A Message From Martha by Mark Avery
Reviewed by Terence Jagger This is an important centenary year; on 1 September, 1914, the world’s last Passenger Pigeon (Ectopistes migratorius) died in Cincinnati Zoo. Her name was Martha, and…