With chapters named after birds and presenting short avian facts, Cara Benson's forthright memoir, An Armsfull of Birds: A Personal Field Guide to Love, Loss, and Commitment, establishes her belief that despite sorrow, struggle, and tragedy, nature provides solace, even in the face of its own destruction.
A published poet with a journalist's style, Benson documents her recovery from substance abuse only to face anxiety, "self-loathing," and "internal recrimination." ("Ravens became associated with the dead and with lost souls.") Her account is not chronological, illustrating the complexity of her journey. In the chapter "Burrowing owls," she relates how she and Jon, "two profoundly wounded people learning how to love," met at a recovery meeting and made a home, but he died by suicide 12 years later. Benson's prologue notes that, at 55, her focus is now on a "creaturely sense of connection with and respect for my environment."
Benson also nurtured a passion for hiking, mastering the 46 Adirondack peaks. She details her summiting of "the Daks" and even more challenging climbs. She appreciated Jon's love for the birds at their feeders, and he supported her environmental activism. Adjusting to losing him, she bought a home in upstate New York, "witnessing firsthand the stresses we humans were putting on the planet," breaking her "already broken heart." She concludes, settled in her forest, that love and grace grow from loss, inspiring hope for the natural world, too. --Cheryl McKeon, Book House of Stuyvesant Plaza, Albany, N.Y.