Customer Reviews

Singing Stone

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Thomas Lowe Fleischner was an Outward Bound instructor bringing city folk into the Escalante for many years before writing this book. It is well written and entertaining, and provides a wealth of information in the realm of natural history: plants, animals, ecology, geology plus the pre-historic and historic human history of the area. A very nice book that will enrich your visits to the Escalante.

Without a doubt, the Escalante River is worth writing about. It's a thin ribbon of shallow, silty water that winds a crooked course among some of the most beautiful slickrock and sandstone walls this side of Mars. It's got reeds, arches, beaver dams, sunlight, and the remnants of forgotten people. It's one of the most amazing places on earth, and it deserves volumes written in praise of it.

That said, that's what this book's about.

So, it's got to be at least okay, right?

Don't worry. It is.

It's okay.

It's got a good chapter on touring Glen Canyon Dam, a nice piece on the mystery of missing artist Everett Ruess, and some good descriptions of the rocks and plants and wildlife.

It does drag on at points, though--as slow and muddy and meandering as the river the author's writing about.

...But maybe that's what he was going for.

I read this book about a month before I visited south central Utah for a hiking vacation. One of my destinations was the Escalante area. My vacation was more enjoyable because I knew a lot of the landmarks and names associated with the area from the book. When I had finished reading this book, I wished it had been longer. That is an indication to me that this was a "good" book.

I truly enjoyed all aspects of this book. My husband and I hiked the Boulder Mail Trail in October and purchased several books on the area so I could learn more about it. This book included personal hiking narratives that I could relate to and touched on important issues facing the West - such as cattle's effect on the environment and tourism. It helped fill in some blanks on my knowledge of the area. I'd also recommend the book by Jerry C. Roundy titled "Advised Them To Call The Place Escalante".

Thomas Lowe Fleischner takes his education and background and takes us exploring down the hidden canyons in the new Grand Staircase-Escalante National Monument. In his academic writing, Fleischner investigates the connections between sciences, humanities, and public policy, and between analytical and creative modes of thought. He points out that we have no benchmark to know what the New West looks like naturally without the effects of grazing: the cows got there before the naturalists got a look. Fleischner's work is well known in the conservation movement and frequently cited, but Singing Stone takes the reader into a passionate, personal narrative of the Colorado Plateau. If Dr. Fleischner gets bored we should put this guy on our staff at Torrey House Press.

My son Nick is working on a degree in Environmental Studies at Prescott College. Earlier this year Nick wrote on his Facebook wall, "My understanding of reality is under construction. Forms and patterns are emerging everywhere. I can't stop seeing the world anew. Hooray college for massaging my mind!" Words of beauty to a the tuition paying father's ears! It's from the efforts of professors like Tom Fleischner that Nick receives such stimulation. Nick grew up roaming the Colorado Plateau in our newest Colorado Plateau national monument, and his professor's book is an intimate tour of the natural history of this remote and utterly unique landscape, places that you and I are not likely to find without him. -Mark Bailey

Thomas Lowe Fleischner was an Outdoor Education instructorbringing city folk into the Escalante for many years before writingthis book. It is well written and entertaining, and provides a wealthof information in the realm of natural history: plants, animals, ecology, geology plus the pre-historic and historic human history of the area. A very nice book that will enrich your visits to the Escalante. END