Appalachian Summer

Rating:
Summary: Lots of lessons on nature, and a few about being human, too
Review: Appalachian Summer is the third of Marcia Bonta's season chronicles of the natural life that populates the mountain in central Pennsylvania that she and her family call home. As with all her books, Appalachian Summer is a bounty of historical and scientific facts about nature. The first in her seasonal series, Appalachian Spring, duly reports the natural life unfolding from winter. In the second, Appalachian Fall, her daily journal also picks up a sinister subplot as an unethical lumberer threatens the mountain and local wildlife. In this new volume, the Bontas have taken back the land ravaged from timbering and the natural observations haromonize with more personal notes about family events. An appreciation of the fragility of life shadows the family's happiness though when the search for a missing child and her abductor moves onto their land. Bonta never forgets, however, that her mission in sharing her journal is to bring the reader up close to the wonders of nature and this she does in clear prose that tinkles with the exotic names of the plant and animal life that share our planet but are infrequently observed or respected. I regret there is only one season left for her to profile. When I read Bonta's books, I not only learn more about nature, I learn more about humankind.

Rating:
Summary: Lots of lessons on nature, and a few about being human, too
Review: Appalachian Summer is the third of Marcia Bonta's season chronicles of the natural life that populates the mountain in central Pennsylvania that she and her family call home. As with all her books, Appalachian Summer is a bounty of historical and scientific facts about nature. The first in her seasonal series, Appalachian Spring, duly reports the natural life unfolding from winter. In the second, Appalachian Fall, her daily journal also picks up a sinister subplot as an unethical lumberer threatens the mountain and local wildlife. In this new volume, the Bontas have taken back the land ravaged from timbering and the natural observations haromonize with more personal notes about family events. An appreciation of the fragility of life shadows the family's happiness though when the search for a missing child and her abductor moves onto their land. Bonta never forgets, however, that her mission in sharing her journal is to bring the reader up close to the wonders of nature and this she does in clear prose that tinkles with the exotic names of the plant and animal life that share our planet but are infrequently observed or respected. I regret there is only one season left for her to profile. When I read Bonta's books, I not only learn more about nature, I learn more about humankind.