Diane P. reviewed The Feather Thief: Beauty, Obsession, and the Natural History Heist of the Century on + 4 more book reviews
Really fascinating. An inside look at the unique world of fly-tieing.
Maura (maura853) -
A fascinating subject, that really could have used a better editor to make it a stronger book.
It's a great story: in 2009, Edwin Rist, a young man obsessed with the esoteric "art" of tying salmon fishing lures, using the feathers of endangered and extinct birds, broke into the Ornithology Department of the Natural History Museum in Tring, Hertfordshire, and helped himself to the preserved carcasses of hundreds of rare birds, some over a hundred years old and originally collected by Alfred Russel Wallace, contemporary and rival of Charles Darwin. So far, so fascinating.
Unfortunately, this reads like a very interesting first draft, with lots of potential to turn it into a fine book. It's just a terrible shame that no one saw the need to do the work necessary to achieve that, and a rather disappointing first draft is what we are left with.
The flaws are on the micro and macro level. The writing is okay, just. He uses the right words, in the right order, but there is no flair, and there is an awful lot of padding. Johnson's attempts at local color come overs as clueless and dull. (English ale does not taste like flat diet Coke and warm lager, thanks very much .... )
But it's the bigger picture that's the real disappointment: this is (or could have been) a fascinating book about obsession. It seems like every aspect of the story, past and present, involves obsession of some sort. Alfred Russel Wallace was obsessed with collecting rare species of birds -- thousands of 'em, at real danger to his health, wealth and sanity. Edwin Rist was obsessed with tying salmon flies -- and with his own egotistical self-image, as a "superior" person who was worth only the very best. Kirk Wallace Johnson himself became obsessed with Rist's unlikely "heist," trying to track down the bird skins he stole from the Museum in Tring, and identifying Rist's accomplices. And so on ...
All this is great stuff, and Mr. Johnson knows it -- but he doesn't know exactly what to do with it. How does he draw all that together? How does he arrive at a satisfying consideration of obsession, that leaves you, at the end -- even as crime goes unpunished and questions aren't answered -- feeling as if we have gotten an insight into our own obsessions? How does Johnson make it all make some kind of sense?
The answer is, he doesn't -- and consequently, the ending of "The Feather Thief" feels flat and unsatisfying. I'm not sorry I read it, not at all -- I just wish that that the better book that is in there had been given a chance to come out.
It's a great story: in 2009, Edwin Rist, a young man obsessed with the esoteric "art" of tying salmon fishing lures, using the feathers of endangered and extinct birds, broke into the Ornithology Department of the Natural History Museum in Tring, Hertfordshire, and helped himself to the preserved carcasses of hundreds of rare birds, some over a hundred years old and originally collected by Alfred Russel Wallace, contemporary and rival of Charles Darwin. So far, so fascinating.
Unfortunately, this reads like a very interesting first draft, with lots of potential to turn it into a fine book. It's just a terrible shame that no one saw the need to do the work necessary to achieve that, and a rather disappointing first draft is what we are left with.
The flaws are on the micro and macro level. The writing is okay, just. He uses the right words, in the right order, but there is no flair, and there is an awful lot of padding. Johnson's attempts at local color come overs as clueless and dull. (English ale does not taste like flat diet Coke and warm lager, thanks very much .... )
But it's the bigger picture that's the real disappointment: this is (or could have been) a fascinating book about obsession. It seems like every aspect of the story, past and present, involves obsession of some sort. Alfred Russel Wallace was obsessed with collecting rare species of birds -- thousands of 'em, at real danger to his health, wealth and sanity. Edwin Rist was obsessed with tying salmon flies -- and with his own egotistical self-image, as a "superior" person who was worth only the very best. Kirk Wallace Johnson himself became obsessed with Rist's unlikely "heist," trying to track down the bird skins he stole from the Museum in Tring, and identifying Rist's accomplices. And so on ...
All this is great stuff, and Mr. Johnson knows it -- but he doesn't know exactly what to do with it. How does he draw all that together? How does he arrive at a satisfying consideration of obsession, that leaves you, at the end -- even as crime goes unpunished and questions aren't answered -- feeling as if we have gotten an insight into our own obsessions? How does Johnson make it all make some kind of sense?
The answer is, he doesn't -- and consequently, the ending of "The Feather Thief" feels flat and unsatisfying. I'm not sorry I read it, not at all -- I just wish that that the better book that is in there had been given a chance to come out.
