The Birds of Heaven: Travels with Cranes
Acclaimed writer Peter Matthiessen, a self-professed "craniac," has been  observing and studying all kinds of birds most of his life, but his pursuit of  cranes is closer to a spiritual quest than a naturalist's exercise. These  majestic, mythic, and notoriously shy birds, capable of soaring at heights of  20,000 feet, are often fond of remote and rugged places, so just locating the  birds can be difficult enough, determining an accurate number often impossible.  Some locales, such as the breeding grounds on the Platte River in Nebraska,  boast flocks half a million strong--"by far the greatest crane assemblies on  earth"; other areas support only a precious few. Matthiessen's search for 15  different species of cranes has taken him to hidden corners of Siberia, China,  Mongolia, Tibet, Sudan, and Australia (where Atherton cranes were not even  discovered until 1961). Despite his many years of adventure and wide travels,  each crane sighting is still a thrill for him, and his curiosity and contagious  enthusiasm bring the book alive. ButThe Birds of Heavenalso serves as  an ecological warning: "Perhaps more than any other living creatures, they evoke  the retreating wilderness, the vanishing horizons of clean water, earth, and air  upon which their species--and ours, too, though we learn it very late--must  ultimately depend for survival."--Shawn Carkonen