Product Description

"Quirky, unassuming, humorous, enlightening, and just a little bizarre" (Washington Post Book World), Heinrich's chronicle of his year spent alone--except for his pet raven--in a cabin with no running water or electricity in the Maine woods brings readers back to the drama in small things, when life is lived consciously.

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #61465 in Books
• Published on: 1995-11-07
• Original language: English
• Number of items: 1
• Binding: Paperback
• 272 pages

From Publishers Weekly
A professor of zoology at the University of Vermont, Heinrich here recounts a recent year he spent in the western Maine wilderness. With his pet raven Jack, he began his sojourn at the end of May. His cabin, without electricity or plumbing, sat in a clearing a half-mile up a steep brush-filled hill accessible only to four-wheel-drive vehicles. His mailbox was at the foot of the trail, and his nearest neighbors lived on the road beyond the mailbox. To keep in touch with family and friends, Heinrich, author of the National Book Award nominee Bumblebee Economics, installed a phone and answering machine in the neighbors' outhouse. He takes us through his busy summer and fall of chopping wood and making repairs to the cabin, all the while observing the wildlife around him. He battles with blackflies and mosquitos, mice and cluster flies. In January he conducts an on-site seminar for selected students. For readers who love the outdoors, even vicariously.
Copyright 1994 Reed Business Information, Inc.

From Library Journal
Heinrich, a zoology professor at the University of Vermont and the author of Ravens in Winter (LJ 8/89), has written an engaging book about his year of solitude in the southern Maine forest. Recalling Thoreau, he retires to a self-constructed log cabin, without electricity or running water, to study and write. Heinrich's account of the year is divided into four sections, one for each season, beginning with the summer that he set out for his cabin with his pet raven, Jack. Each section consists of small vignettes-some dated, as if from the author's journal, others lessons in biology, ecology, or astronomy. It is a tribute to his writing skill that the author quickly draws the reader into his world. From retrieving the spikes left by some Earth First! activists to making maple syrup to hauling dead calves into the woods for the ravens to feed on, Heinrich is consistently busy, yet he always finds time to run, rest, and meditate on the lessons the forest has to teach. This is a gem of a book. Recommended.
Randy Dykhuis, OHIONET, Columbus
Copyright 1994 Reed Business Information, Inc.

From Booklist
The journal is the form of choice for the neophyte would-be Thoreau. Heinrich is anything but a neophyte, and his journal is far more satisfying. It is what was once called "natural history"--scientific observation by a talented amateur with the "capacity to wonder," who "can spend hours per day wondering about `useless' things, like the tri-partite feather vane on an arrow (rather than one blade for a wing), like how a samara twirls in the wind." Effusions like that arrive after pages of meticulous, lyrical, tough-minded description. Heinrich's accounts of, say, climax forest equilibrium or building an outhouse are clinically scientific or pragmatic as an instruction manual, yet they rouse in us a sense of wonder and a desire to be there, alone in the woods, experiencing what he does, and believing that we could. (We forget he's a professor of zoology.) Some chapters are essays with morals, some reveal Heinrich's personal life, and those about his relationship with a young raven he names Jack deserve to be anthologized widely. Roland Wulbert

Customer Reviews

Looking Close
To appreciate Bernd Heinrich, you have to be prepared to slow down and look close. After all, the author himself has taken a year's leave of absence from a fast-paced university job to do just that. He wants to spend time in his beloved woods, study the creatures that live there and see where long rambles will take him. It not the sort of book to begin with an agenda in mind.

That said, I found A Year in the Maine Woods a quixotic mix of science and human exploits - a glimpse at the lives of a whole host of insects, birds, mammals and plant life I never knew existed, and a chance to share in one person's approach to learning.

Examples? Let's take Heinrich's penchant for climbing trees. For a full-grown, adult male he really does spend a lot of time in them, and as a result has some interesting stories to tell. There's the day he finds himself scrambling up a tree to avoid a moose who refuses to yield the right of way on a trail, and the time a doe wanders under the apple tree he is sitting in and proceeds to munch away. No amount of noise or movement on Heinrich's part seems to disturb her until he descends from the tree. Then she's off like a shot!

Here's another example. Heinrich loves ravens. He is fascinated by their intelligence, close-knit family systems, their flying ability and survival skills, and is not above combing the countryside for roadkill in order to provide food for them. Heinrich's exploits with a pet raven are both hilarious and revealing. Here is a man who delights in life itself and is willing to put up with a fair amount of discomfort and irritation to learn about it.

If you enjoy learning about special places on our planet, and the creatures that inhabit them, through the eyes of those who have studied and know them intimately, then this book will delight you. If, on the other hand you like your reading to be full of fast-paced action and spine-tingling climaxes, this is not the book for you. Be prepared to read slowly and savor the pictures Heinrich offers.

Not What I Expected...But Still Okay

This is the second book by Heinrich that I have read. The first, Ravens in Winter, I found very enjoyable. (see review)

Based on the title and a review written on the book's back cover, I expected the book to be about Heinrich's year alone, except for his pet raven, Jack. With this in mind I thought we'd learn about his discoveries in nature and also his understanding into his own thoughts as he pondered life in seclusion.

This was not a book about living in the wild woods of Maine in seclusion. Heinrich often went into town and ate, met with neighbors, had family visit, and at one point he had a number of students over for a couple of weeks. Was this bad...no, but not what I expected based on the review on his book's back cover.

Heinrich has a gift in sharing information about nature. His curiosity and excitement for the natural world is contagious. In this respect I wasn't let down. He did go on quite a bit about the various things he noticed, sometimes sharing too much information, but I would just skip the paragraph and move on.

I think what appeals to me most are the times he is in seclusion and reflects on nature and his own life. He endures an amazing amount of cold...below zero, doesn't have running water, and the inside temperature in his cabin dips down below freezing on several occasions. I would enjoy many of the aspects of living in the location he speaks of but I would do it with a few extras...insulation in the walls, and electricity are two that come to mind!

Overall I did enjoy the book and I hope you do too!

A raven review...
Not planning to review this book, I changed my mind after perusing the reviews for "A Year in the Maine Woods." Most of them are by people who miss the point of his book (and, dare I say, life) entirely.

Yes, Bernd is foremost a Zoologist, and so does get a bit technical at times, but his over-whelming love of nature--and the sense that he's just a good guy doing what many of us are afraid to do (i.e. kick in our TeeVees and "get back to nature")--is enough for my vote.

In addition to the natural science found in these pages, I very much enjoyed his mundane, day-to-day observations (every time he made coffee or drank a beer, I inwardly smiled). He mixes his love for the woods with a few 21st-century earthly pleasures, as well he should. Of course he's no Thoreau, and I don't think he is in anyway trying to be. Still, he's a damn-sight closer to Nature and the ideas and mind of H.D.T than most.

Truly a pleasurable read. Thanks, Bernd.