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A delicately rendered memoir on motherhood, family, and the beauty of the natural world.
In fall 2007, Lynn Thomson experiences a huge life shift. Her teenage son, Yeats, is just beginning high school. Yeats has always struggled against the system, against the pressure to conform. He is a poet at heart: acutely sensitive, highly intelligent, and solitary by nature. Lynn and Yeats have always been close, but after fourteen years as a stay-at-home mom Lynn is going back to work for her husband, Ben, who has just opened his own bookstore.
When Lynn and Yeats take a trip to Vancouver Island, they discover a mutual love of bird watching. Lynn is the only other person Yeats has found who loves nature and watching birds. Plus, she has a car. Lynn describes in wondrous detail the many trips she and Yeats take, from the Wye Marsh and Pelee Island in Ontario, to Vancouver Island in British Columbia, to an ill-fated trip to the Galapagos Islands. The two grow closer with each bird-watching expedition. At the same time, Lynn notices that her son is beginning to pull away — and she must learn to let go.
Birding with Yeats is a delicate, sensitive, and gentle reflection on the unique bond between a mother and son, and the magic that is the natural world.
“Among all the anxious books out there about how to ‘manage motherhood’ this one is truly (and literally) a breath of fresh air. Lynn Thomson and her teenage son share a love for the natural world that takes them to the wild and silent corners of Tofino, Pelee Island, and the Galapagos. Her account of these expeditions is a gentle, unselfconscious guide to the toughest part of parenthood: how to love our kids at the same time we let them go.” — Marni Jackson, author of Home Free and The Mother Zone