A review by keepreadingbooks
Wild Geese: A Collection of Nan Shepherd's Writing by Nan Shepherd

adventurous challenging informative inspiring reflective slow-paced

3.75

Wild Geese started out really strong and then ended up being a bit of a mixed bag. But a collection of different writings will, in most cases, end up being a mixed bag, so I’m not disappointed at all. The stronger parts for me were, especially, the initial short story Descent from the Cross as well as the Deeside Field writings (beautiful, beautiful writing). There was some good in the selected prose pieces at the end and a few of the poems spoke to me too, but surprisingly, I wasn’t too enamoured with her poetry in general. Her essays on three Scottish poets were a drag and felt like homework (disclaimer: I’m sure they are good and well-written pieces, I am just not interested in the whole poets-on-poets thing; it reminds me of university and, as I said, homework), and the rest of the book was fine. 

My overall impression is good, however, and I do want to read more of Shepherd’s work. I have read The Living Mountain, which was excellent, but it was fun reading something fictional from her hand in the shape of the short story. It made me keen to give one of her novels a go one day. For now, though, her nature writing remains strongest with me.