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Title: Bear Witness
Author: Mandy Haggith
Narrator: Eilidh McCormick
Format: Unabridged
Length: 10 hrs and 58 mins
Language: English
Release date: 04-25-13
Publisher: Saraband
Ratings: 2.5 of 5 out of 2 votes
Genres: Fiction, Contemporary
Publisher's Summary:
The brutal shooting of a bear cub galvanises ecologist Callis MacArthur into becoming an activist. She dares to dream of bears roaming wild and free again, even in Scotland. But with the authorities blocking her path at every step, she has no choice but to take increasingly radical steps if her dream is ever to become a reality. As Callis begins to embrace the wild side of her nature, she finds herself swept up in powerful new emotions that compel her to risk her career, her friendships and her whole way of life.
With a combination of lyrical prose, mythical themes, romance and a cracking plot, Bear Witness pulls off the rare feat of being a page-turner with a heart and a mind. Audio recording and editing by Blake Brooks.
Critic Reviews:
"A passionate and subversive book, written with a poets touch." (Jason Donald)
"An ecological page-turner lyrical and vivid, written with a poets eye for detail" (Linda Gillard)
"Daring and beautifully worked" (Jim Crumley)
Members Reviews:
Embracing Bears
On one level, Mandy Haggith's second novel, Bear Witness imagines reintroduction of bears as top predators in two European ecosystems. It's a good read, and the pace quickens as ecologist Callis McArthur is charged with coming up with a system for rating suitable bear habitat, as a result of popular support for Norwegian government action following the shooting of an endangered bear and her cub by a farmer. Callis finds an ally in Romanian wildlife scientist Petr Scazia, but early progress in the reintroduction scheme is thwarted by politics, a mysterious attack on Callis's scientific reputation and the ever-present weight of bureaucracy. When the Norwegian program stalls, Callis ponders the possibility of reintroducing bears to her native Scotland.
Haggith's descriptions of the Scottish landscape are vivid. Here she is describing the fictional Glenmathan estate, where bears already roam, protected by high fences:
"But as fast as the weather deteriorated, it changes again and the clouds part to brilliant blue, with sunshine slicing across the hills, beaming and blinding. We reach the back of the woods as the last sunset lights glint. Bracken glitters, clusters of wet rubies hang heavy from rowan branches and birch leaves flutter to the ground. We brush our way through the drenching undergrowth into the dusk, weary now, and still two miles from home."
Her landscapes reflect a deep sense of place, both the current view dictated by history, as well as what is possible from changes in policies and practices.
There are other levels to this engaging novel. American author Terry Tempest Williams, in her collection of essays, An Unspoken Hunger, tells several bear stories. She tells of a woman's dream in Yellowstone park: " A grizzly, upright, was walking toward me. Frightened at first, I began to pull away, when suddenly a mantle of calm came over me. I walked toward the bear and we embraced." Upon hearing the dream, the woman's friend says matter-of-factly, "Get over it."
But Williams suggests that giving up the dream of embracing the bear is to turn our backs on the possibility of ".... undressing, exposing and embracing the Feminine...
