Reviews for The Bird Catcher

The average rating for The Bird Catcher based on 2 reviews is 3.5 stars.

Review # 1 was written on 2011-09-21 00:00:00 Debbie Vondervoort If the editorial reviews currently quoted at Amazon are any guide (and I'm not sure they are), Laura Jacobs's first novel, Women About Town, may have been more widely admired than this, her second. Thought it's been some time since I read the former (and, for that matter, it's been a while since I finished the latter), I'm inclined to think that The Bird Catcher is an advance, in ways both large and small, over Jacobs's earlier work. In this book, Jacobs has raised the stakes for Margret Snow, her central character (there's only one this time around), and for herself. For her character, there are bigger challenges to deal with. For Jacobs, there's a more ambitious thematic scheme (based in part on oppositions such as art and nature, observing and making, detachment and engagement), a more complex narrative structure, and an attempt to deal with longing and loss and that troubling question of deciding how to use oneself in the world. Margret is a window dresser, although there's enough interweaving of past and present that one must say she is also a young girl being initiated into the mysteries of bird-watching by her grandfather, and a graduate student pursuing art history, and a number of other things as well. Jacobs is so good at devising and reading shop windows that the phrase "window dressing" seems an unjust dismissal; still, just as there's something out-of-the-mainstream about windows, so is there something peripheral, not quite on the path, about Margret's place in the world. To use the Manhattan terminology, she has encounters with the downtown art scene and the world of uptown dinner parties, not to mention an increasingly intimate involvement with birds and birding and birders. (Many of the novel's pleasures come from this last; even if you're not one who thrills simply to hear the names of some of these creatures, you'll have to have a high degree of immunity not to want to go out and see some of them yourself after reading this.) But you can't help feeling, as some of the other characters do, that Margret could be doing more, and the working out of what that more will be is satisfying enough that I'd count this as a novel about growing up even though it's not about being young. Many reviews (and a Publishers Weekly excerpt that's likely to show up) have chosen to reveal something that comes up on page 59 of this 292-page novel, as if it were part of the situation, not the development. While it is part of Margret Snow's situation, the way it emerges, and the fact of it not being disclosed at the outset, seems to me an essential part of the way the novel works, one of its prizes as well as one of its surprises. Instead of naming it, I'll say only that there's a hurt in this book, one of those things that smolders underground, like a coal-mine fire that can't be put out. The Bird Catcher is more lyrical than dramatic, but that's not a criticism. Luckily for us, fiction nowadays is far less subject than mainstream film is to the expectation of eventfulness. Though there is action and drama here, one is apt to remember conversation and tone and evocation as much as anything else. Nothing I've said yet conveys what it feels like to read the novel. Maybe a sentence from the opening chapter will be enough of a taste: "They had discussed this subject often: the power of beauty, how it takes you, and the attempt to turn the table and take it, and that's where the trouble begins."

Review # 2 was written on 2010-08-16 00:00:00 Sean Ramey Bird watching is a very subtle hobby. Birders focus on the small things that are around us all the time, ignored by the masses of people who may be nearby. Birders have patience and a quiet, inquisitive mind that enables them to pursue a specimen in any kind of weather, and go where ever the search may take them. In Central Park, it's especially imaginative to think of these bird lovers spending their free moments searching, admiring, and carrying nothing away but their memory. This is the backstory to The Bird Catcher. The lead character Margaret falls in love with a fellow birder, a man named Charles who is actually one of her professors. They spend their early courtship exploring birds in Manhattan. In her real life, she's a window dresser for Saks, and she assists her friend Emily in acquiring unique pieces for an art gallery. These three form the backbone of the book, and each of them are well-developed characters. The story doesn't fall into any expected formula, and the characters are actually very interesting. Jacobs manages to display each characters unique personality by showing what they say and do. While the main characters are female, I wouldn't dream of calling this "chick lit"; it has more depth and more complexity by far. Conceptually, this is a great book. However, I had numerous issues with the story itself. First, we learn early that Charles has passed away, but we aren't told how or when, which builds a curiosity as you read. Margaret seems to be explaining her relationship with him in flashbacks, but it's never entirely clear what is past and what is present. Even through the end, when you discover what happened to Charles, the explanation feels too brief to understand her resulting grief. Their relationship appears perfect, and the cynic in me can't imagine everything that wonderful. In addition, for a talented woman, she spends a terribly large amount of time worrying over her parents approval (she didn't finish college). She also seems strangely reserved around other people, which is odd because she describes herself as an extrovert. A few other things struck me as off: while the descriptions of the art of window dressing for sales is fascinating, her description of her gay coworkers plays to stereotypes and is insulting in its own way. All of them appear flighty, silly, babyish, and primadonna queens. She seems to want to describe this professional career but ends up mocking the workers who put it together with such art. Additionally, she and her friend Emily are very fluent in the high-brow culture scene in New York: art, opera, and fashion. I consider myself having a good basic knowledge of popular art, but I understood maybe a tenth of the references to current artists. All of this almost feels like she's telling the reader "if you don't understand, you're an imbecile", since so much of the story is dependent on understanding the art references or the works of a particular obscure designer. It's never a good idea to make your reader feel stupid! Sure, I could have looked them up, but there were so many, I really didn't feel like doing the homework. It felt a tiny bit pretentious. On a positive note, her explanations of the actual window dressing is interesting, and her friend's art gallery holds interest as she explains how the provenance of different objects can be manipulated for profit. The biggest bit of unexpected knowledge is Margaret's interest and decision to learn taxidermy, and the details of this further hobby are more interesting that I'd expected. This isn't a bad novel, and the quick pace makes it very readable...at times I did get overwhelmed by names and brands, but I finished it with a sense of contemplation.