When Sy Montgomery went to spend a day at falconer Nancy Cowan's farm, home to a dozen magnificent birds of prey, it was the start of a deep love affair. In this account, Sy reveals the world of hawks and what they can teach us about nature, life, and love.
... radiant ... Along with tales of her growing familiarity with raptors, including her participation in the Audubon Society's Hawk Watch and the introduction to a falconer neighbor's hawk, Montgomery delivers a snappy survey of the history of falconry, with its specific equipment and terminology ... Collapsing the distance between birds and people, this concise and charming book feels custom-made for readers of Helen Macdonald's H Is for Hawk.
Montgomery, whose 2010 book The Soul of an Octopus made her a favorite of animal-book readers, turns her formidable descriptive passion to hawks, and to the world of falconry ... Readers who share Montgomery’s original empathy and compassion for animals might want to proceed cautiously. The protracted, dramatic set-piece that serves as the book’s climax is Montgomery’s evocative description of a field hunt ... Fortunately, there’s plenty of compensation. The book breathes with glorious prose and challenging insights into a very strange world. In The Hawk’s Way, Sy Montgomery and her publisher have crafted a sharp little gem of a book, something fit to stand with classics like T.H. White’s The Goshawk or Helen Macdonald’s H is for Hawk. The next time any reader catches a glimpse of a hawk soaring over a field or highway, they’ll think of this little book and feel an extra shiver of wonder.
Montgomery honors the hawk and other birds of prey in this engrossing work ... the book contains outstanding images by nature photographer Tianne Strombeck. This title delivers as a celebration of the wildness and wonder of birds and as an inspiration to learn from other creatures and be more compassionate ... Recommended for anyone with an interest in falconry and predatory birds.
Image by Gerd Altmann from Pixabay[/caption]
