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by: Sue Halpern  List Price: $23.00 Price: $14.20 You Save: $8.80 (38%)Prices subject to change. Availability: Usually ships in 1-2 business days
Edition: 1st Format: Bargain Price Number Of Items: 1 Number Of Pages: 224 Publication Date: May 01, 2001 Related Items:
Browse for similar items by category: Click to Display Editorial Review: Amazon.com Review: Sue Halpern, a gifted student of the natural world, has a knowing passion for butterflies--"not love, exactly, offered suddenly, but a similar quickening of heart and desire ... tugging on my imagination as if it were a loose sleeve." In Four Wings and a Prayer, that passion takes flight in quest of the monarch, a species of butterfly suddenly much in the news. In the company of freelance biologist Bill Calvert, ecologist Homero Aridjis, and other scientists and activists, Halpern travels into the highlands of Michoacan, Mexico, to which monarchs born east of the Rocky Mountains migrate each autumn, flying as much as 200 miles a day to get there before the onset of the highland winter. There she ponders the complexities of the monarch's life--after all, she writes, "how did the monarch butterflies from the eastern United States and Canada, millions of them, end up every year in the same unlikely spot, a remote and largely inhospitable fifty acres of oyamelis pine forest?"--and the unfortunate events that have felled monarchs by the untold millions in recent years, including the destruction of habitat and climate change. Halpern's enthusiasm for Lepidoptera is catching, and her graceful advocacy of the monarch should inspire renewed concern for their well-being in the world. --Gregory McNamee Product Description: Every autumn, the monarch butterflies east of the Rockies migrate from as far north as Canada to Mexico. Memory is not their guide — no one butterfly makes the round trip — but each year somehow find their way to the same fifty acres of forest on the high slopes of Mexico’s Neovolcanic Mountains, and then make the return trip in the spring. In Four Wings and a Prayer, Sue Halpern sets off on an adventure to delve into the secrets behind this extraordinary phenomenon. She visits scientists and butterfly lovers across the country, offering a keenly observed portrait of the monarchs’ migration and of the people for whom they have become a glorious obsession. Combining science, memoir, and travel writing, Four Wings and a Prayer is an absorbing travelogue and a fascinating meditation on a profound mystery of the natural world. From the Trade Paperback edition. Average Rating:
 Rating:  - Caught in the Mystery of Why Anyone Should CareI had read this book for school, and by the first page I knew it was going to be a painful experience. The first fifty pages weren't so bad, after that, everything went downhill. I was never less interested in butterflies in my life. At first, the topic of the story was clear- going to a convention in Mexico about saving the monarchs. After that, nothing made sense- the storyline no longer had any real point. The author jumped around from date to date in no particular order. At one point, I wasn't ... Read More Rating:  - The Gifts of the Monarch ButterflyThis wonderful little book has opened my eyes to so much more than I ever expected. I have just returned from Mexico and the Monarchs. Sue Halpern's book was like my road map into this magical, mystical and transformational experience Rating:  - Caught up in the Mystery; Review from an Oklahoma State University StudentI liked this book because of the facts it includes and the connections it makes between science and human feelings. Over the ages many people have been amazed by the monarch butterfly's migration every year; however very few are interested enough to understand their complexity. Sue Halpern is one of the few who is interested enough to attempt to solve the mystery. In her book Four Wings and a Prayer: Caught in the Mystery of the Monarch Butterfly she reports her findings, in a fast-paced interesting ... Read More Rating:  - Promises but doesn't deliver . . . pass this one up!I read a brief review of this book in the NYT Book Review and it sounded exciting and enlightening . . . alas, it's quite dull and offers surprisingly little information whether or not you're a butterfly fancier. To tell the truth, I read the second half of the book just to find out what in the world she could possibly fill all those pages with! There are a few neat facts about monarchs, and intriguing portraits of a few eccentric lepidopterists, but the rest is statements like "we really don't know [fill ... Read More Rating:  - Boring for non-devoteesI suppose if you are extremely interested in monarch butterflies you will find this book fascinating. I must admit I read only 100 pages. I enjoyed the beginning, when Halpern traveled to Mexico, but after page 100 the book was too academic, filled with the points of view of various monarch afficionados. Pretty dull stuff. I didn't think the writing was all that great, either. I suppose it was an academic success, but it didn't draw me in to the adventure. 
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