Heartfelt, enchanting, and beautifully written.
An invigorating dive into the world of owls.
In a smooth mixture of memoir and nature writing, Darlington, author of Otter Country, does for owls what Rebecca Giggs did for whales in Fathoms. Interwoven into the discussion of Darlington’s fieldwork is the story of her son’s mysterious illness. Fortunately, as with the author, his encounters with owls seem to bring him immense joy, to be “infected with owlishness.” Darlington’s original goal was to observe all of the wild species that reside in the British Isles. She begins by discussing barn owls, sharing details of the rewarding time she spent volunteering with the Barn Owl Trust and their surveys. She describes her encounters with the rarely seen tawny owl, which has an “unsettling cry,” a little owl that glared at her with “ferocious lemon-yellow eyes,” and a short-eared owl that nearly landed on her head. Darlington’s research took her to Serbia, Finland, Spain, and France, and the author is consistently enthusiastic about her experiences in each locale, whether reveling in the “melancholy call” of the Eurasian eagle owl or picking out the “highly vocal” call of the pygmy owl, a “tiny owl…the size of a pine cone.” Darlington also warns that the owl population in Britain is in decline due to human activity, particularly the use of chemicals to treat rodent infestations and encroachment into their natural habitats. Throughout, the author’s lyrical prose is captivating: “The high moorland was woven with August colour, splashed with purple heather and coconut-scented gorse….There was a stroking southerly breeze that seemed to whisper through the grasses warning of the end of the summer.” Ultimately, writes Darlington, “all an owl wants is to be left in peace, to make its living, to bring up its young safely and without disturbance, to continue the bloodline. Not so different from us, really.”
Heartfelt, enchanting, and beautifully written.Pub Date: Feb. 7, 2023
ISBN: 9781953534835
Page Count: 336
Publisher: Tin House
Review Posted Online: Nov. 14, 2022
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Dec. 1, 2022
BOOK REVIEW
It’s not Shakespeare, not by a long shot. But at least it’s not James Franco.
A noted actor turns to verse: “Poems are a Saturday in the middle of the week.”
McConaughey, author of the gracefully written memoir Greenlights, has been writing poems since his teens, closing with one “written in an Australian bathtub” that reads just as a poem by an 18-year-old (Rimbaud excepted) should read: “Ignorant minds of the fortunate man / Blind of the fate shaping every land.” McConaughey is fearless in his commitment to the rhyme, no matter how slight the result (“Oops, took a quick peek at the sky before I got my glasses, / now I can’t see shit, sure hope this passes”). And, sad to say, the slight is what is most on display throughout, punctuated by some odd koanlike aperçus: “Eating all we can / at the all-we-can-eat buffet, / gives us a 3.8 education / and a 4.2 GPA.” “Never give up your right to do the next right thing. This is how we find our way home.” “Memory never forgets. Even though we do.” The prayer portion of the program is deeply felt, but it’s just as sentimental; only when he writes of life-changing events—a court appearance to file a restraining order against a stalker, his decision to quit smoking weed—do we catch a glimpse of the effortlessly fluent, effortlessly charming McConaughey as exemplified by the David Wooderson (“alright, alright, alright”) of Dazed and Confused. The rest is mostly a soufflé in verse. McConaughey’s heart is very clearly in the right place, but on the whole the book suggests an old saw: Don’t give up your day job.
It’s not Shakespeare, not by a long shot. But at least it’s not James Franco.Pub Date: Sept. 16, 2025
ISBN: 9781984862105
Page Count: 208
Publisher: Crown
Review Posted Online: Aug. 15, 2025
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Sept. 15, 2025
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
SEEN & HEARD
A blissfully vicarious, heartfelt glimpse into the life of a Manhattan burlesque dancer.
A former New York City dancer reflects on her zesty heyday in the 1970s.
Discovered on a Manhattan street in 2020 and introduced on Stanton’s Humans of New York Instagram page, Johnson, then 76, shares her dynamic history as a “fiercely independent” Black burlesque dancer who used the stage name Tanqueray and became a celebrated fixture in midtown adult theaters. “I was the only black girl making white girl money,” she boasts, telling a vibrant story about sex and struggle in a bygone era. Frank and unapologetic, Johnson vividly captures aspects of her former life as a stage seductress shimmying to blues tracks during 18-minute sets or sewing lingerie for plus-sized dancers. Though her work was far from the Broadway shows she dreamed about, it eventually became all about the nightly hustle to simply survive. Her anecdotes are humorous, heartfelt, and supremely captivating, recounted with the passion of a true survivor and the acerbic wit of a weathered, street-wise New Yorker. She shares stories of growing up in an abusive household in Albany in the 1940s, a teenage pregnancy, and prison time for robbery as nonchalantly as she recalls selling rhinestone G-strings to prostitutes to make them sparkle in the headlights of passing cars. Complemented by an array of revealing personal photographs, the narrative alternates between heartfelt nostalgia about the seedier side of Manhattan’s go-go scene and funny quips about her unconventional stage performances. Encounters with a variety of hardworking dancers, drag queens, and pimps, plus an account of the complexities of a first love with a drug-addled hustler, fill out the memoir with personality and candor. With a narrative assist from Stanton, the result is a consistently titillating and often moving story of human struggle as well as an insider glimpse into the days when Times Square was considered the Big Apple’s gloriously unpolished underbelly. The book also includes Yee’s lush watercolor illustrations.
A blissfully vicarious, heartfelt glimpse into the life of a Manhattan burlesque dancer.Pub Date: July 12, 2022
ISBN: 978-1-250-27827-2
Page Count: 192
Publisher: St. Martin's
Review Posted Online: July 27, 2022
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