Barefoot-Hearted : A Wild Life Among Wildlife [Bargain Price] (Hardcover)

~ Kathleen Meyer (Author)

Editorial Reviews

Amazon.com Review

Memoirs by urbanites who homestead in the country and learn hard lessons in the bargain are many, but few attain the depths of a Walden or Pilgrim at Tinker Creek. Readers of those books will want to spend time with Kathleen Meyer's sometimes playful, sometimes somber Barefoot Hearted, which brings a resolutely modern sensibility to some ancient problems--among them, how to live with the creatures on whose homes humans have intruded, and how to learn the arts of self-sufficiency.

Meyer, the author of the indelicately titled but highly useful How to Shit in the Woods, recounts how she and her partner set about making an old Montana barn into a fit home. The job was daunting, she learned: in winter, the place was so cold that she had to bundle up in gear befitting an Antarctic explorer, no easy garb for, well, performing certain functions. And, she found, the barn and its environs had become a shelter for many animals, some of which she welcomed (among them bats and, strangely, skunks), some of which she reluctantly waged war against (specifically a never-ending army of mice). She sets those challenges against a thoughtful, ongoing discussion that touches upon important philosophical issues: the responsibilities of those who live on the edges where civilization and wilderness meet, and the responsibilities of humans to preserve what little of wild nature is left in a time of wholesale extinction and slaughter.

Wise, literate, and often moving, Meyer's memoir is required reading for anyone contemplating a move to places beyond the avenue--and for anyone who values a good story well told. --Gregory McNamee --This text refers to an alternate Hardcover edition.

From Publishers Weekly

Meyer (author of the unlikely international bestseller How to Shit in the Woods) offers a thoughtful and irreverent account of her life cohabitating with bats, skunks, mice and an Irish gypsy horseshoer named Patrick McCarron, in a 75-year-old dairy barn in Montana's rural Bitterroot Valley. Meyer describes the couple's struggles to balance the needs of the natural world with their own, recounting many amusing anecdotes to support her contention that "the person passionate to live gently, with cheek and ear to the ground, is mightily challenged to figure out how." For instance, efforts to control deer mice and cluster flies, both of which threaten to overrun her barn, lead to questions of the power that "ordinary, all-powerful Homo sapiens" have to determine which species will survive. The couple learns to adapt to such unusual circumstances as baby bats dive-bombing them at night and skunks spraying the barn during their mating season. Meyer also helps care for bears driven from their habitat by sprawling towns and lack of food, and reflects on the decline of native trout populations. Drawing on interviews with local naturalists and scientists, including well-known writer David Quammen (Song of the Dodo), she provides a wealth of information about each species, though at times gets bogged down in unnecessary detail. Although mostly focused on environmental concerns, Meyer's loosely structured account does include personal elements, including frequent references to Patrick and an account of their empowering journey across the Continental Divide via covered wagon, yielding a compelling portrait of a life lived close to nature.
Copyright 2001 Reed Business Information, Inc. --This text refers to an alternate Hardcover edition.

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Product Details

• Hardcover: 368 pages
• ISBN-10: 0375504389
• ASIN: B000FUO0H4
• Product Dimensions: 9 x 5.7 x 1.3 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.4 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 3.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (2 customer reviews)
• Amazon.com Sales Rank: #1,089,079 in Books (See Bestsellers in Books)

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

1 of 1 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars The adventurer I wanted to be., March 1, 2009

By	L. Klein "too many books, too little time" (Cookeville, Tennessee United States) - See all my reviews (REAL NAME)

I really enjoyed this book. She did a number of things I always wanted to do, but "the real world" prevented it. (Raised a large family alone, etc.) I think the feeling I got was of someone who could look after herself, and was a "helper" as well as a "helpee",. Independent, but still able to love and give to someone else.

4 of 9 people found the following review helpful:

1.0 out of 5 stars Don't bother, August 22, 2004

By	Buffalo Gal "PJ" (Montana) - See all my reviews

Don't bother with this one. Basically an autobiography, the author's life is not book-worthy.