I came across Jim Crumley’s writing only fairly recently but it is a case of a deferred pleasure being very sweet. This 400+ page book is a reworking of his four recent volumes on The Nature of [Season] and is a joy to read. The reworking takes the form of leaving out some whole passages from the four volumes and the editing down of some of the others. It results in a book which is intensely readable (and takes up less space on your bookshelves than the four volumes do).
Almost all of the scenes are set in Scotland, many of them in the Highlands, but northern England gets a visit too as do Iceland, Greenland and Norway and an Antarctic ice shelf. I wonder what immersion in southern England would draw from this author? Would he feel inspired or adrift, or both? I’d love to find out.
But this book deals with nature that I know quite well and places that I know quite well and it all seems very true to my experience but Crumley just seems to see things clearly that I feel I have missed. This is a book from an author that can inspire those with a good knowledge of wildlife but also, I feel, draw in others to that subject through the beauty of the writing and the incisiveness of the observation.
A great book, and obviously a book for all seasons.
The cover? Quite nice. I’d give it 6/10.
Seasons of Storm and Wonder by Jim Crumley is published by Saraband.
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I am working my way through all 4 books at present and I connect strongly with his observations of Nature . I have read a number of his wildlife books and I love them .
I have read all four of the books that are used in this reworking so will probably not buy it. however I love jim’s writing having been brought to it by a gift of one of his earlier volumes by my partner, a gift that keeps giving as I have now read many of his works and they are all very good, he sees things we don’t always and writes about them and the things we do see so wonderfully. inspirational indeed.