Product Details
A Supremely Bad Idea: Three Mad Birders and Their Quest to See It All

A Supremely Bad Idea: Three Mad Birders and Their Quest to See It All
By Luke Dempsey

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Product Description

“Riotously funny, utterly enthralling…Dempsey’s a hoot.”—Minneapolis Star Tribune

It began innocently enough, when two eccentric guests at L uke Dempsey’s weekend home pointed out a small bird flitting through his garden. Dempsey, entranced, found himself falling head over heels. Before he knew it, he and his friends were off on an epic birding journey down the backroads of America, in search of the country’s rarest and most beautiful birds. A Supremely Bad Idea is the hilarious story of their trip—what WildBird magazine calls “as close as we have to Bill Bryson’s A Walk in the Woods.”

Product Details

  • Amazon Sales Rank: #15793 in Books
  • Published on: 2009-08-04
  • Released on: 2009-08-04
  • Original language: English
  • Number of items: 1
  • Binding: Paperback
  • 272 pages

Features

Editorial Reviews

From Booklist
It starts as an innocent experiment, something undertaken just out of curiosity. Then it becomes a hobby and quickly an obsession, until you’re skipping work and taking trips across the country to feed your addiction. Birding—or bird-watching, as it’s more commonly known—is, if this very entertaining book is any indication, a much more exciting, lively, and suspenseful pastime that one might expect. Dempsey’s memoir chronicles the newly divorced, newly committed birder’s cross-country odyssey, in the company of two friends, in search of rare birds. Along the way, they meet a host of interesting folk, including a backyard Noah and a band of smugglers; but what they find, most of all, is peace of mind, a reappreciation of nature, and a better sense of what matters in the larger scheme of things. A gentle, contemplative memoir punctuated by frequent bursts of hilarity and weirdness. At some points, the book reads like a cross between Bill Bryson and Dave Barry (or perhaps Patrick McManus), and that’s a very good thing, indeed. --David Pitt

Review

“A gentle, contemplative memoir punctuated by frequent bursts of hilarity and weirdness. At some points, the book reads like a cross between Bill Bryson and Dave Barry (or perhaps Patrick McManus), and that’s a very good thing, indeed.”—Booklist

“Dempsey succeeds where few authors do. He masterfully shows how a few chance encounters can transform a seemingly normal guy (or gal) into someone obsessed with birds.” —WildBird magazine

About the Author

Luke Dempsey is the editor in chief of Hudson Street Press, a division of Penguin USA. He lives in New York City. This is his first book.

Customer Reviews

Couldn't put it down5
I picked this book up because of the crazy-looking bird on the front cover -- I'm not a birder, nor did I think I had any interest in birding. But Dempsey's quick wit and hilarious anecdotes make the book not only a pleasure to read but also a really fascinating look into birdwatching, even for the uninitiated. The author is the antithesis of the geeky birdwatcher, relating his escapades with sharp, candid humor, and I found myself laughing out loud frequently -- beware of reading this in public places! It also made me much more curious about the birds I see every day, I even found myself wondering if I should buy a pair of binoculars and a bird book, just in case the brown bird with the reddish patch I keep seeing on the lawn really is a rare bird and not just some kind of sparrow.
I have been recommending this book to everyone I know -- birders or not. Anyone looking for a well-written, witty read would enjoy it, and it leaves you afterward with a new appreciation of the feathered beings in the backyard.

Not just for birders! 5
This was a delightful book - as a very modest birder I am now inspired (especially to go to Central Park) and to never travel without my binoculars. And as a reader, I found the book well written and very funny and the characters were terrific - especially Don. Great read, lots of information, lots of laughs - highly recommended.

One to add to your Life List5
When a friend recently gave me a copy of "A Supremely Bad Idea", I would have ranked my interest in bird watching as #3, directly behind elective groin surgery and spending quality time with my Mother in Law. (#4, BTW, is front row seating at a Celine Dione covers Barry Manilow concert.)

But author Luke Dempsey has made me an enthusiast - very much of his work, and even of ornithology (well, at least to some extent). In the tradition of writers like Bill Bryson and Tony Horowitz, Dempsey gives us a glimpse inside a micro-culture we'd likely not otherwise explore. Wrapping important lessons in biology and ecology in an irresistible travelogue, Dempsey shares with readers his passion for birding and his observations about life here in his adopted homeland.

We accompany the freshly divorced author and his quirky birding friends, Don and Donna Graffiti, on bird watching excursions across the U.S., learning at least as much about them and the colorful folks they meet along the way as the colorful birds they hope to see. Dempsey's voice is distinctive and his style - sometimes irreverent, occasionally endearing, and always entertaining - is a delight. Short ante-chapters work well to add dimension to the primary story line and help it keep pace.

Discovering an author like Luke Dempsey gives me some appreciation for the adrenaline jolt a birder must feel when he spies a life bird for the first time. I hope we'll be seeing more of this author in the future.

-Jeff Yeager
Author, The Ultimate Cheapskate's Road Map to True Riches