SACAJAWEA AUDUBON SOCIETY BOOK CLUB
This month the SAS Book Club meeting will be held on January 17th at Hope Lutheran Church, Room 129 from 6:30 to 7:45 pm. We hope you can join us in person or virtually for a discussion of Fox and I: An Uncommon Friendship by Catherine Raven (2021). Dessert will be provided. Please bring your own hot drink.
After completing a PHD in biology at MSU, the author puts a pause on pursuing a traditional academic job, buys three acres in a remote mountain valley in Montana, making a living by occasionally teaching field courses in Yellowstone National Park and wildlife biology courses online. She settles into being an active steward to the juniper trees, thistles, voles, magpies, ravens, and a diversity of other “unboxed” wild creatures. Solitude comes easily to Raven who, at age 15, chose early college admission in order to leave a father who wanted her “to disappear” and who could be violent. The sense of belonging and rewarding relationships with others eludes her among humans, yet comes easily as she interacts with birds and wildlife in the mountains.
Early in her residency in the mountain valley, a small red fox starts appearing close to her doorstep every afternoon at 4:15 pm, and settling at a comfortable distance while she reads The Little Prince aloud to him. Eventually their friendship expands as trust builds on both sides. Raven is a perceptive observer of not only Fox and his family, but also the omnipresent birdlife and other living creatures on the land. Her powers of observation, both scientific and intuitive, are remarkable. Her grit as she does the physically exhausting work needed to return the ecosystem on her parcel of land closer to normalcy, shows that Raven is no slouch when it comes to honoring commitments to her nonhuman community. Ultimately, the lessons learned with Fox and on the land nudge her toward giving life among humans a second chance.
Rarely does a naturalist and writer arrive on the national scene with a voice as original and compelling as Catherine Raven’s. Perhaps these qualities were recognized when the author received two national writing awards for Fox and I.
By the end of “Fox & I,” I found myself deeply lonely for the kind of belonging Raven found on the land. How did we end up so distant from our animal friends? As she writes: “Maybe we like pretending that they are not very human. Or that we are not very wild.” – Katherine E. Standefer, author of “Lightning Flowers.”
AWARDS: Winner PEN/E.O. Wilson award; Winner Nautilus GOLD award; Best Books of 2021, Christian Science Monitor; Short-list John Burroughs Medal
Cost: $6-$16
If you would like to be included in monthly email reminders or to attend the meeting virtually, please email Elisabeth Swanson at elsswa@gmail.com or contact her at (406) 570-8325. For other questions, you can email our other leader, Hilary Johnson, at ralphhilary@gmail.com, or call her at (406) 599-1446.
