The Parrot's Lament: And Other True Tales of Animal Intrigue, Intelligence, and Ingenuity Book

I'm persistently disappointed with this book. The title and introduction promise a series of stories without the attempt to add scientific questions and theorizing. That's what seems to be promised. And there are a great many interesting stories, some of which I haven't encountered in other books. But the scientific drivel that you have to wade through between stories is tedious at the best of times. The book doesn't present itself as a scientific study, and it really isn't, and yet the author apparently can't help himself in discussing the potential emotions or thought behind these behaviors and the evolutionary reasons that might be at work. It's extremely annoying to me, because I was drawn in by the promise of animal stories, not scientific prattling. Prattling has its place and interest, but I like to be warned beforehand that that's what I'm going to be reading.
As a result of this sidetracked theorizing and meandering, the reader is actually forced to revisit earlier stories so that the author can postulate theories and questions about them that should have been brought up to begin with.
I am especially disappointed by the last two sections. The one claiming to be about heroism barely has any stories and indeed the author says he knows some but won't tell us because they're covered in other books and magazines (so what? That chapter is just filler? Basically). And the final chapter is largely about his adventure into the African jungle, which is completely off from the rest of the book and even further off from what the book promised (and failed) to be. A book about his ventures into the wilderness and personal experiences with animals might have been intensely interesting, but he barely casts a glance at those anecdotes.
With the scientific babbling removed, the book is about seventy percent orangutan stories, with ninety percent of those being escape. Maybe he should have titled it "Ape Escapes" rather than The Parrot's Lament. Persistent distraction with whether or not the military should use animals and how the natural world needs to be preserved also scampers about. Because that's not what the reader was lured in with, it becomes an annoyance rather than a point of interest or thought.
In short, while the prattling has its interesting moments and the stories themselves are fascinating, I always come away from reading this book feeling... lied to. Tricked. Fooled. And I don't like it. I don't like it at all.
But I do find the stories interesting, and am forced to revisit them on occasion because of that, and I'm willing to wade through the scientific sludge to get to them.