Rating: 
Summary: Nature writer vs. naturalist who writes
Review: Basically, as stories about animals we don't have much contact
with, this is a pretty good book. As science, well... Two sentences that floored me read, "How could anything that heavy float? But doesn't the moon float?" Uh, Ms. Ackerman, the moon is outside the earth's gravitational pull and ships float. What exactly was your point?
Rating:
Summary: Nature writer vs. naturalist who writes
Review: Basically, as stories about animals we don't have much contact
with, this is a pretty good book. As science, well... Two sentences that floored me read, "How could anything that heavy float? But doesn't the moon float?" Uh, Ms. Ackerman, the moon is outside the earth's gravitational pull and ships float. What exactly was your point?
Rating:
Summary: Nature writer vs. naturalist who writes
Review: Basically, as stories about animals we don't have much contact
with, this is a pretty good book. As science, well... Two sentences that floored me read, "How could anything that heavy float? But doesn't the moon float?" Uh, Ms. Ackerman, the moon is outside the earth's gravitational pull and ships float. What exactly was your point?
Rating: 
Summary: Interesting and informative.
Review: Diane Ackerman does her usual great job of making the natural world fascinating to her readers. Interesting facts clearly written. -- Craig Chalquist
Rating:
Summary: A keen observer with a poetic eye
Review: Diane Ackerman's sharp observations, poetic descriptions, reflective commentary, and search for knowledge make this an enjoyable reading experience. My favorite piece was the one on bats, with their amazing echolocating screams, biological helpfulness for making many plants survive, and intriguing wing designs. Ackerman does a good job of dispelling many horror stories about bats, showing how they have gotten a bad rap over the years. Her article on crocodiles was also enthusiastic and winsome. I thought the whale essay was a little slow and monotonous in parts, otherwise I would give this book a five star rating. Definitely a good book to read by the fire or relax with at the beach.
Rating:
Summary: A keen observer with a poetic eye
Review: Diane Ackerman's sharp observations, poetic descriptions, reflective commentary, and search for knowledge make this an enjoyable reading experience. My favorite piece was the one on bats, with their amazing echolocating screams, biological helpfulness for making many plants survive, and intriguing wing designs. Ackerman does a good job of dispelling many horror stories about bats, showing how they have gotten a bad rap over the years. Her article on crocodiles was also enthusiastic and winsome. I thought the whale essay was a little slow and monotonous in parts, otherwise I would give this book a five star rating. Definitely a good book to read by the fire or relax with at the beach.
Rating: 
Summary: The Light is Clear
Review: Here is an author I would like to call and thank. Not only is she articulate, poetic and interesting, but her fascination with and love for her subjects shines in every essay she writes. Here is the very special world of a woman who sees with the clarity of a scientist and writes with the perception of a poet. Moreover, she writes from her own experiences hanging out in front of bat caves, tackling 500 pound alligators and cuddling baby penguins in refrigerated nurseries. Nothing stops her and not much phases her, but a lot of what she sees and experiences makes her stop and think. It is the thinking that attracts me as much as her stories. She is hard at work on her own vision of the world and the place human beings occupy in it. It is a vision worth considering. Expect to be drawn with lyrical, insightful writing into the worlds of the creatures Ackerman studies, but expect to find yourself looking down the throat of some tough questions as well. I always come away from one of her books with some new thoughts to chew on. This book shouldn't be missed.
Rating:
Summary: Enchanting
Review: I think this was the first book by a naturalist that I ever read (and it was many years ago that I first read this book) that was utterly enchanting and engaging. Most books of this nature are didactic with occasional leaps into literary writing. Ackerman, in contrast, balances fact with fancy and reality with conjecture; she balances personal experience with the universal; she asks original questions that have no known answers; she merges conversation with conservation; she gives us a sense of who she is without losing the thread of what she's writing about. Not being particular scientific, I was surprised to find myself clinging to every word, reading the book straight through in perhaps two nights of bedtime reading.
The chapters on diverse topics can be read separately as individual essays, but there's a sense of progression of Ackerman's life that lends a personal touch to the book. These wonderful essays found their first home in The New Yorker. Subjects are all over the map: bats, alligators, penguins, and of course the whales of the title, which reads like a misprint - but isn't. In the process, Ackerman underscores man's responsibility to act in the protection of the world's other creatures: we are but one among many (and we're hugely outnumbered, BTW).
Besides being a perfect melding of animal lore, objective study, and conservation, The Moon by Whalelight is an example of nonfiction storytelling at its best.
Rating:
Summary: Interesting and informative.
Review: This book encompasses the best of both poetry and natural beauty. Though Dr. Ackerman does sometimes get lost in the turn of a phrase, one cannot help but be caught up in her passionate adventures and her reverence for nature.
Rating:
Summary: Lyrical, beautiful, and majestic
Review: This book encompasses the best of both poetry and natural beauty. Though Dr. Ackerman does sometimes get lost in the turn of a phrase, one cannot help but be caught up in her passionate adventures and her reverence for nature.
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