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22 of 23 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
A Modern Fable, July 15, 2003
This review is from: The Wind Masters: The Lives of North American Birds of Prey (Paperback)
Dunne's unusual book hovers in a crosswind. Parts natural history and literate essay; parts short fiction and pure fable, The Wind Masters imagines a new way into the minds of North American raptors. Through a series of brief narratives, one for each native species, Dunne introduces the birds of prey as individuals - moreover, as beings of thought, emotion and opinion. For a falconer prone to think of some birds as persons, it is a familiar yet still startling flight of fancy. To Dunne's eye, the Northern Goshawk fairly gloats atop her recent kill, a snowshoe hare. She feels a satisfaction any hunter might in the successful execution of her skill and power, and in the anticipation of a good meal; as the author notes, "Who can say this isn't so?" A hunter himself, and a long-time student of raptors in the wild, Dunne's gripping portrait of a master assassin bears truth. Were each of his subjects equally or solely lauded for their hunting prowess, Dunne's work might comprise a long cliché or worse, a sort of book-length perpetuation of negative raptor stereotypes. But it does neither. What Dunne finds worth noting of each species reflects a careful sifting of scientific fact and personal observation; he tries to find the essence of each bird and how each uniquely suits its niche. He attempts, through the form of the short story, to capture a similar holistic image of our predatory birds that was the focus of his earlier, more utilitarian Hawks in Flight. This might be a hopeless conceit for a writer of lesser skill, but Dunne manages it well and often beautifully. "The Gray Hawk remained until just before dark and then departed - a hungry gray shadow flying swiftly and directly to roost. It wasn't lack of skill that had defeated his efforts to feed. It was the temperatures that had turned his reptilian prey to stone and sent the birds to early roosts. It was circumstance and bad luck - the luck of a raptor." Every facet of a raptor's life, from the struggle to escape the egg to the peril of migration and the battle for breeding rights finds illustration through the individual stories. No single account hopes to convey every part of that bird's natural history; rather the commonalities between all raptors' lives are distributed throughout the balance of the book. Fittingly, the many ways our raptors die receive as much notice as do the ways they live. Sometimes a death provides the focus for the story. "The eagle managed to stand until the raven completed his retreat. Then, surrendering to gravity, she slumped to her booted tarsi and fell forward until her emaciated keel touched the earth. Only the opened wings, spread like stabilizing outriggers, prevented the bird from falling to her side." Rarely do Dunne's descriptions approach simple sentimentality or fall prey to the temptation of polemics. Each chapter can stand alone as a work of good craftsmanship and a careful exposition of story; in each a fair and informed picture appears of a raptor as an individual and a species unique. But the implication of man's effects, mostly negative, finds expression everywhere. In the oldest tradition of the fable, Dunne artfully imbues his narratives with cautionary, sometimes pointed details illustrating the harm our actions (and inaction) may bring. Whether or not the reader finds these details an intrusion or an obstruction, they are certainly part of every raptor's life and of the truth Dunne hopes to reveal.
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7 of 7 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
Short, informational stories that are quite entertaining, August 18, 2005
This review is from: The Wind Masters: The Lives of North American Birds of Prey (Paperback)
The Wind Masters is a collection of 34 short stories (most only about 3-5 pages) that are meant to inform the reader about the habit and behavior of the North American birds of prey (Hawks, Eagles, Falcons, Vultures, etc..).
I was very pleasantly suprised to discover how well Dunne managed to include so much information while telling an entertaining vignette. It seems like this would be a very good book for beginning birders to learn about raptors before reading something more substantial. It offers very basic information (range, eating habits, simple ID characteristics) that you could get elsewhere but would not be able to absorb the information as well.
Highly Recommended.
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4 of 4 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of 5 stars
Gripping tales of life and death, February 17, 2007
This review is from: The Wind Masters: The Lives of North American Birds of Prey (Paperback)
Thirty-three birds of prey - one to a chapter - star in this book that is a blend of natural history, fast-paced adventure, and reflections on life and death. In "The Wind Masters," Pete Dunne introduces each of North America's diurnal raptors by telling a story in the life of an individual bird (from the author's imagination, of course, but biologically accurate). So vivid are these introductions that they will not soon be forgotten.
I was shocked by the gruesome, painful details described in some of the stories. Many do not have happy endings. A sharp-shinned hawk, pursuing a sparrow, slams into a glass window, and the chapter ends with her on the verge of succumbing to a brain haemorrhage. A young osprey sinks her talons into a huge fish that pulls her under the water to her death. A golden eagle slowly succumbs to lead poisoning, struggling to eat but finding her digestive system paralyzed, and choking as her stomach fills with rotten food.
But, the lives of raptors abound in exhilarating moments too, and it is these upon which Dunne focuses most of all. An arctic Gyrfalcon searches the moonlit landscape to find his mate who, he knows by instinct, has just returned from migration. A common black-hawk hunts in a stream by dangling her wing-tip in the water, attracting fish who think it is a struggling insect. A peregrine falcon successfully defends her nest from a marauding wolverine. And a group of broad-winged hawks ride thermals to travel over two hundred miles without a flapping a wing. Dunne highlights the adaptations of each raptor that make it perfectly suited to its life in the air, hence the title "The Wind Masters."
The woodcuts by David Allen Sibley are superb. Each chapter contains a head portrait of the bird on the title page, as well as a full-page illustration of the bird in its habitat later in the chapter. That's 66 illustrations in all!
I greatly enjoyed this book, and its striking images will stay with me for a long time. The only reason I withheld the fifth star is that I found some elements of the writing a bit awkward in places - such as anthropomorphism that felt strained, or long parenthetical facts that interrupted the flow of the story. Overall, though, Dunne has succeeded admirably at blending biological detail with fast-paced narrative. This is a unique and beautiful book that I would recommend to anyone who enjoys natural history.
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