Play Live Radio
Next Up:
0:00
0:00
Available On Air Stations

Letters from Eden

"Big, Medium, and Tiny Fergus fresh from the farm pond"
/
/
"Big, Medium, and Tiny Fergus fresh from the farm pond"

This one's for the bird people. And the devotees of life's simple pleasures. And the sentimental who dream of living on 80 wooded acres delicately crisscrossed by avian feet. It's a tough sell, I know.

What I didn't know -- much to my embarrassment -- was that author Julie Zickefoose is often heard on NPR's All Things Considered. So in choosing her bucolic bedside reader, I'm pushing nothing beyond a truly charming book -- written in the same soft language she uses in her on-air pieces, and made irresistible by her drawings. Wait for page 157, where a squabbling Carolina wren writhes on its back like a kid having a tantrum, or page 53, where a spirited phoebe alights in a watercolor dream.

I'm not sure what I like better: the flow of short stories that capture the rhythms of her days; the annotated sketches (I love reading her penciled notes); or the watercolors, which are likely to elicit a few aching sighs. Envy her acreage and its jewels if you must, but hey, at least she has the good grace to share them. (Read an excerpt from the late-November meditation, "A Winter’s Tale.")

Copyright 2023 NPR. To see more, visit https://www.npr.org.