A review by sleuthheroalien
Better Living Through Birding: Notes from a Black Man in the Natural World by Christian Cooper

adventurous challenging emotional informative inspiring reflective medium-paced

4.0

If you’re looking for a good audiobook, then I highly recommend this one. Cooper’s narration was enthusiastic and so fun. It’s the story of his life leading up to an incident in Central Park that went viral during the pandemic, when a white woman called the police accusing him of threatening her and endangering her life, when he was only asking her to put a leash on her dog in a no-leash part of the park. His life story was interesting, there were a lot of fun lessons about birding, and some truly poignant and cathartic moments. My only complaint is that some of the stories went on a bit too long and didn’t seem totally relevant to the story. And, for me, there wasn’t enough about birding. I’m a fan of nature essays, but this wasn’t a nature essay book, which I thought it would be from the title. Instead it was a series of compelling stories from his life. It was a great book, though, if you know what to expect.