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3.93 AVERAGE
3.93 AVERAGE
Incredibly entertaining, this book was finished in a day. Great preview to the work done with Alex. 4 stars because I'm more into the science/technical aspects of the research, but I enjoyed reading about the emotional relationship between Dr. Pepperberg and Alex. I can't wait to delve into The Alex Studies.
Irene Pepperberg's memoir of her work training and measuring the linguistic capacity of her African gray parrot, Alex, is emotional and intellectually fascinating. She goes into detail about the concepts Alex learned, how she taught and tested him, and why his accomplishments are meaningful, but this is not a strictly scientific book; it's a memoir, and Pepperberg places all this in the context of her life, the (largely hostile) academic climate in which she produced her work, and of course, her relationship with Alex. She speaks of Alex with great affection, and it is clear that they had a special bond. You really come to know and like the alarmingly intelligent, emotive, haughty, mischievous bird. He's full of personality, and it comes through clearly in this book. It's a great character study and it gets into complex issues about language, cognition, and human-animal communication.
informative
reflective
sad
The interesting, but sometimes repetitive story of Alex and his trainer. Sometimes the book felt like it suffered from too much copy and paste action, but it was deeply emotional and I enjoyed it a lot in the end. Have Kleenex handy.
This book made me want an African Gray Parrot. :) I'm glad I encountered the sassy, strong-willed and perceptive personality of Alex through this book.
informative
inspiring
reflective
fast-paced
I really enjoyed this book- both as a shared biography of Irene and Alex and as a nice summary of the research conducted with Alex over the years.
Enjoyable, fast read. The big surprise was how deeply I fell for Alex -- and even though I knew the end, tears dripped down my face. My daughter was taken with Alex as well -- and she and I talked about it for more than an hour. "Tell me another Alex" story. FYI: Alex is a grey parrot who reminds me a lot of my two-year-old son.
Alex & Me [...] grabbed my interest due to a common theme: my parents own an African Grey named Alex. It was a very good read, brushing through Dr. Pepperberg and Alex's progress spanning the 31 years of his life. If I read this book for no other reason, I really enjoyed the dedication Dr. Pepperberg showed to training Alex, and realizing her dream.