{"product_id":"9781495117756","title":"Birdbrain: Go Ahead. Love Your Planet. Just Not Too Much.","description":"\"Eco-fiction\/Eco-comedic-drama\" in the vein of  Ed Abbey meets Vine Deloria meets Tom Robbins meets John Irving meets T.C. Boyle meets Pam Houston meets Barbara Kingsolver while Rachel Carson birdwatches in the front yard.  It's all here, and more!\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eThink of it as a chronicle of the American environmental movement circa late 1970's-80's through the eyes of an innocent but partying young country girl who has suppressed so much while waiting for her working class guy to get a clue...\u003cbr\u003eIt's accidentally gazing at an eastern bluebird that cracks the thin veneer of her life, finally jolting her out of a marriage-induced lobotomy to the realization that the world doesn't end at her skin.  Life bashes her around a bit which releases her intellectual tendencies, pissing off her rural friends--\"Drink Another Beer! Enjoy the Barbecue! Lighten Up!\"\u003cbr\u003eThe more interested she becomes in nature, political causes, maybe attending college, i.e. adventuring out of the womb of her rural Michigan, the more maligned she feels from her family and friends, especially Patty, her life-long best friend. Will their friendship survive all the changes  (they are both going through)?\u003cbr\u003eOf course, for those of us who love the land of our country, at some point, like Ellie, we dare to question the tendency of our own species to bulldoze over the planet, and there was a lot of this going on at the time. By questioning this, Ellie is further transformed as she dives deeper into the world of ecology; then she meets Kate who she could become and nobody likes Kate.  Kate is always pissed off.\u003cbr\u003eAdding to the turmoil are colossal losses she has little idea how to deal with. Ellie leaves \"Shake\" to undertake some kind of pilgrimage, a subconscious attempt to heal herself but her feeling of alienation does not abate simply because she changes her geography. Her taking to the road makes for a very 'biodiverse' set of experiences, from roaming spirits in the desert, gnatcatchers in California, accidental crusades against development, ascending tufas at Mono Lake courtesy of a Miwok\/Paiute BLM park ranger, to dancing cowboys and hoodoos in Wyoming, not to mention those sympathetic truckers on I-8O.  In addition to being humorous, birds and ecological science are woven throughout the novel so you may just learn something.\u003cbr\u003eThe novel is based on the real-life experiences of Virginia who has been a professional field biologist for over 20 years. Virginia grew up in Ohio where she watched everything around her get bulldozed out of existence. She did the trip west, the one we all do sooner or later, only to see the same thing happening in the west.\u003cbr\u003eAre we at a point now where it's too late and denial is our only (perceived) protection?","brand":"Ecological Outreach Services (EOS)","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":47174532169968,"sku":"9781495117756","price":4.99,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0737\/7593\/9824\/files\/9781495117756_p0.jpg?v=1763665857","url":"https:\/\/shop-qa.barnesandnoble.com\/products\/9781495117756","provider":"Barnes \u0026 Noble (DEV)","version":"1.0","type":"link"}