Great Smoky Mountains: A Vistor's Companion (National Parks Visitor's Companions)

Rating:
Summary: Weak illustrations cast doubt on book
Review: I'm a biologist who has spent a fair amount of time in western NC. I know something of wildlife and the Smokies, and I buy books like this to learn more. I also judge the usefulness of guidebooks by how closely they fit with what already know. I only recently bought the Visitor's Companion, and it looked quite worthwhile. However, as I was doing an initial skimming of the volume, I noticed the illustrations were not at fine as I first thought. Many of the animals looked a little chunky, and the trees were a bit squat and artificial. The Box Turtle's plastron just didn't look right. But when I reached the deer. . . I know deer, and no whitetail has a rack like the one pictured on p. 198. It looked like a touch of mule deer, elk and possibly some Asian species all fused together. What it reminds me of is an illustration from a 16th century beastiary or on a heraldic emblem -- drawn with heavy artistic license. I guess I expected the photo-realistic quality of a Peterson guide rather than a drawn-from-memory sketch. Had I noticed this earlier, the book would have hit the shelf instead of the counter. As it is, I am looking over the drawings of salamanders and songbirds with a more critical eye, and will be more likely to doublecheck the facts in the text.