Like all friendships, common bonds form the basis for this mutual connection between author Raven and a wild fox on her isolated land in central Montana; they both interact easily with nature, are boundlessly curious, wary of most humans, and lack daily company. For Raven, the burgeoning relationship is as rewarding as it is perplexing as she reconciles this unique bond with her scientific training as a biologist -- and her realization that she seems to have formed a deeper connection with a wild fox than with most people.

Raven is a wonderfully gifted writer whose descriptive prose often immerses readers in enchanting paragraphs that transport readers to her magical Montana landscape. Consider this evocative passage about a nighttime encounter with Fox’ playful offspring “Riveted, I strained my eyes to watch their undisciplined performance in the moon’s light, and my other senses diminished as if I were dropping slowly underwater. Gulping air, holding my breath, I fell into the night with unfettered foxes swimming all around me.”

The pace may not be for everybody; some hikers are destination-focused. Raven is the knowledgeable and eloquent guide you want if you would rather absorb, savor, and reflect on the nuances of nature surrounding you.

A lonely woman of science and nature's true story of her friendship over a few years with a wild fox. Heartbreaking!

I was given a complimentary copy of this book. All opinions expressed are my own.

I am a real nature/animal lover so thought I would love this book. Especially about a fox since we have a resident red fox at our new house. However, I could just never get past the attitude throughout the book. I thought the fox and her relationship would be the central story but it wasn't. It was more about her and that wasn't what I was looking for.

"Fox and I" by Catherine Raven is, at its simplest level, the story of one isolated woman's unlikely relationship with a wild fox, and this alone--how he keeps returning to visit her at the same time each day; how she reads excerpts from "The Little Prince" to him; how he leads her on walks on his favorite trails and into his world--makes for interesting reading. But there's so much more to this memoir--beautiful descriptions of the natural world ("Indian ricegrass seed heads with ice-coated grains swayed in the light breeze, looking like chandeliers"); considerations of how we as humans treat "boxed" animals (pets) versus wild ones; encyclopedic information not only about foxes but about so many animals and phenomenons of the natural world; and a personal reflection from Raven herself on how her background as the neglected child of, as she calls them, "violent" parents led her to withdraw from the world of human connections and retreat into her Montana wilderness, where her relationship with Fox, as she calls him, becomes as rich and meaningful as those most people have with their families and friends. "Fox and I" reminded me a lot of Helen Macdonald's "H is for Hawk" in that both books describe their authors' personal relationships with creatures most people think of as wild and perhaps even vicious but that for them provided needed companionship and purpose at pivotal points in their lives. Fascinating reading.

Thank you to NetGalley and Spiegel & Grau for providing me with an ARC of this book in return for my honest review.

I fell head over heels in love with this book and never wanted it to end. I will be buying my own copy so I can return to its magical pages whenever I need some peace and revival. Catherine’s struggles with people and introversion resonated with me deeply and I was envious of her living alone in Yellowstone. A place I have always wanted to visit. Her relationship with the fox was spellbinding and shows just how we can be a part of nature, welcomed and accepted, when we open our hearts to it. I loved her unique writing style, sharing her everyday encounters with nature in such a wild place and the unique personalities of the animals she lives alongside.

Beautiful, thoughtful writing that sometimes reads as journal entries, so while there is a lack of ongoing, continuous narrative, there are many brilliant, reflective entries that bear re-reading.

I really enjoyed this book, though I find it hard to describe right now…a bit like a lone journey through the fascinating mind of an introverted botanist… It feels personal, yet compelling and edifying.
I loved how the author described the order of nature and all the creatures that play a natural part in the care and maintenance of their environment, and her ways of noticing then observing those behaviors in order to understand the forces at play.
A fascinating observation on cause and effect.

*For those readers who are not familiar with The Little Prince by Antoine de Saint-Exupéry, you might like to read it first. It is a long time top shelf favourite of mine and I found Fox & I enhanced by my knowledge of that beautiful story.

5⭐️s
Many thanks to NetGalley and the publishers for my copy to read and review.

This book has been widely reviewed in major publications. I can only add to the praises and tell you, as I find myself telling my friends: Read it. You will enjoy it immensely.

Fox and I is a beautiful and quirky book. I could relate to the author because during the pandemic, I found myself intrigued by a squirrel who hung out on my back deck and would observe its comings and goings, gave it a nickname, left fresh water for it, etc. Catherine Raven does something incredibly valuable in her book - she has helped me "see" the nature and animals around me in a more integrated way. I really loved her "reading" Antoine de Saint Exupery's book "The Little Prince" to the fox as well as her references to Moby Dick. Catherine Raven's past is a bit more of an enigma with only an occasional reveal so this book is not exactly a memoir. In the end, I was glad I read this book!

I recommend this book.

took quite a while reading this book. It demanded to be slowly savored. It is an exquisitely intertwined tale of self-discovery, love of literature, nature, and, of course, deep and meaningful friendship. This is a book that will make you wonder about the world around you and perhaps, wander from your "box" both physically and mentally. A beautiful book worth every delicious moment.

The Washington Post's review of Catherine Raven’s FOX AND I: An uncommon friendship said, "If a reader is willing, the experience of journeying alongside her as she lives with Fox and meditates about him is extremely rewarding." Others, including The New York Times and Wall Street Journal, also provided very positive reviews. I, however, simply did not have the patience to sit still with Raven and Fox as their friendship developed and am therefore assigning a neutral rating of 3 stars.

Link to full Washington Post review:
https://www.washingtonpost.com/entertainment/books/fox-and-i-catherine-raven-book/2021/07/06/457c3320-de6a-11eb-9f54-7eee10b5fcd2_story.html

Fox & I is an introspective and meandering memoir by naturalist Dr. Catherine Raven on her life in an off-grid Montana cabin and her unlikely friendship with a fox who lived in the area. Released 6th July 2021 by Spiegel & Grau, it's 272 pages and is available in hardcover, audio, and ebook format.

This is such a contemplative book that it's difficult to categorize. It is a memoir, but it's also an expository work on nature, our place in the larger world, our ability to unthinkingly change our environments, our ability to change within ourselves, and what that means in the grand scheme of things. The author is not shy, she holds forth at length on subjects as disparate as domestic cats (lots of antipathy for their uncontrolled and unnatural impact on wildlife), to grownup jobs, friendship, and life.

Always, wandering through the philosophy and rumination, are the lovely bits of dialogue and bits of rumination from Antoine Saint-Exupéry, and other philosophers, naturalists, and poets. Readers who already love The Little Prince with find an extra measure of enjoyment.

This will be a polarizing book. I predict readers will either adore it or loathe it (and not many will land in the no-man's-land in the middle). I personally felt that although there was a *lot* of navel gazing and rumination (every page, more or less), it affected me deeply and I loved reading it. It wasn't always a comfortable read, but it was effective and the author has a deftness and assurance in her writing. I was also impressed by the fact that Raven became a writer to tell the story instead of the other way around and it gave this story a deeper resonance and relatability.

Five stars. I would recommend it to readers who enjoy naturalist writing and memoirs.

Disclosure: I received an ARC at no cost from the author/publisher for review purposes.

Solitude and nature. Well, I've spent plenty of time with both in the past 18 months. Feel fortunate that where I live provides access to both. Living alone in a cabin, miles from nowhere, sounds enticing but not sure I could handle it for any length of time. Though like Walden before her, this cabin would become both the authors challenge and refuge.

A wonderful memoir, a woman whose strength is admirable, making her own way through life and one that she started at a very young age. Her descriptions of fauna and wildlife are breathtaking, she is a keen observer. She also goes into the history of various insights, but it is her relationship with a fox that is the focal point. The fox is young, wild and at times she lets us into what she perceives as the foxes own thoughts, his actions, visuals. She meets with him daily, apart but together, she reads to him for fifteen minutes from The Little Prince. He seems to listen intently. Who can forget a visual such as this?

It is also a book about our relationship or lack of one, with the wild that surrounds us. Our lack of care of the beautiful, natural world we have been given. A warning, a chance to open our eyes before it is to late, if it isn't already. Details of her past, her present struggles and where she hopes to go. I also learned much about voles, which though I had heard of moles, had never heard. Quite fearless little things, smart too. I very much enjoyed this book and thank the author for sharing her unique experiences.

ARC from Netgalley

In the book world, there's something called DNF or "did not finish". The DNF of Catherine Raven's Fox & I was 11 percent.

That's how far I got in the book, a memoir about the author's relationship with a wild fox, before I realized that I had no idea what was going on and I just didn't care enough to continue on and find out.

The book, which comes out on July 6, had potential. Or at least I thought it did based on the glowing reviews from the publisher's marketing team. It was one of those books that I heard about, wasn't sure about, and then the marketing person made a connection between the isolated life of the author and how we were all isolated during COVID quarantine, and I thought, "Okay, why not? Maybe this book will say something profound about humans and nature."

Perhaps it does. It has several four- and five-star reviews on GoodReads. Some reviewers have said that the story does take a while to get going. But when I have so many other books on my to-read shelf, it just doesn't seem worth it to me to slog through something that's not really catching my interest.

Fox & I is published by Spiegel & Grau and will be available to purchase on July 6, 2021. I received an e-ARC in exchange for a review.

4.5★s
“Those of us who have barnacled ourselves to inhospitable places may be trying to avoid people not because we do not like people, but because we love the things that people destroyed. Wild things. Horizons. Trolls.”

Fox and I is a memoir by American teacher and writer, Catherine Raven. After an unsupportive upbringing, the author manages to attain a PhD in Biology, lives in an off-grid mountain cottage in Montana and teaches remotely.

She might be considered reclusive: “Just as I’ve always been alone, I’ve never felt lonely. But I did want to fit in somewhere and belong to something. I tried lashing myself to the land, but it wasn’t reciprocating. Land, I discovered, does not behave like a pet, offering unconditional love just because you own it. I thought I was buying space and rocks and dirt and a creek, and instead I ended up with a community of animals who wanted me to work for my welcome.”

The fox who visits daily, and eventually becomes her friend, appears in some of her slides for her students on their Yellowstone Park field trips, and immediately provokes questions. Raven recalls associates during her ranger work warning her not to anthropomorphise. She feels curious and wonders “Was I imagining Fox’s personality?”

She decides to map the relationship, to be able to explain it, should there be further questions. She goes back to before their paths first crossed, and tells of “The Great Vole Debacle”, which becomes an illustration of how small actions (clearing land and building a house, feeding egg yolks to magpies, collecting seeds, chasing off dogs and feral cats) can ultimately have unpredictable consequences.

“Owning land is a big responsibility. Every step taken, path set, weed pulled, and tree planted fosters a hundred million or so consequences. A great land baron, Nature’s tenant in chief, must justify her actions and their consequences.”

Raven meanders through the story of her initial encounters with Fox, often with lengthy digressions to illustrate a point, describing how she would sit and read to him, games they played and activities they pursued. She recounts those occasions when she returned from time away to no Fox, convinced that he had met with an unexpected end.

Occasionally, Raven swaps the narrative to Fox’s perspective, giving him a personality without the “sin” of anthropomorphising. Tennis Ball, the magpie, also gets a voice.

Raven credits the friendship with allowing her to understand what truly matters in her life: “Like a forest, my life had progressed through several stages and was reaching the climax phase. I knew my relationship with Fox was more important than anything else in my life, and I could see that my purpose would be to tell his story. And purpose, I now knew, was more important than profession.”

Raven’s memoir is a feast of wildlife and botanical description that will appeal especially to those who love or appreciate American flora and fauna. This is a moving, thought-provoking and illuminating read.
This unbiased review is from an uncorrected proof copy provided by NetGalley and Spiegel & Grau.

Fox and I by Catherine Raven was a book that I was drawn to by the description and cover, but unfortunately I found that the writing style just was not for me. I found it a struggle to finish, but I was determined to give it every chance. I struggled with the narrator, and thought the book meandered a lot, which meant it never grabbed my attention the way that I hoped it would.
I read an ARC courtesy of NetGalley and the publisher, all opinions are my own.

Lately I’ve been making bad NetGalley selections, and it really is a shame because the books that catch my eye sound so good!

I choose this one as I love foxes, it has a beautiful cover and it sounded intriguing – simply put, it’s the true story of a lonely woman who befriends a fox. Unfortunately, I found it incredibly boring and pushed myself to finish it.

The author, as a woman in science, doesn’t believe in anthropomorphising animals and when she finds herself doing so with the fox and becoming ‘best friends’ with him, she at first tries to hide it, then makes excuses for it – arguing at one point that foxes with the ‘tame’ gene have evolved by being fed by humans. She seems to try to be rationalising her behaviour when I would argue that she was simply being human.

As I said, I didn’t find the book interesting. Most of the book is not about the fox but rather other wildlife and the author’s observations – including parallels with the writings of Herman Melville, Mary Shelley and Antoine de Saint-Exupéry. I found the writing quite confusing in places too and phrases such as ‘half a fortnight’ baffling. It’s a week.

If I wasn’t already not enjoying the book, I was turned off completely when the author described herself as never having had ‘a gender-appropriate job’. What exactly is one of those? Perhaps a poor choice of words but not a choice that went down well with this reader.

I’m sure there’s an audience for this book, perhaps zoologists or nature enthusiasts, but not casual fox lovers like me.

Thank you NetGalley for the opportunity to read this.

From the publisher’s description, I was really looking forward to reading Fox and I. I’ve been a sucker for stories about individuals bonding with wild creatures since I read The Yearling in 7th grade and sobbed my eyes out. Unfortunately I did not connect with this story in the same way. Catherine Raven tells us over and over again two things about herself. She is a rugged individualist and she has a PhD. She is so intent on being different and smart that the beautiful story of this unique friendship gets lost in the dense paragraphs she constructs. Her frequent references to Ishmael and Moby Dick reminded me I didn’t relate to that book either.
I wish she had tried a little less to impress us with her writing skill and just let the story flow simply from her heart. I’m afraid her style became a way to keep the reader at a distance when she would have been much better served to let down her guard and let the beauty of her connection with this remarkable creature speak for itself.

While it is a well-written account of one woman's relationship with a wild fox, I felt like it took ages for the story in "Fox & I" to really get going. The narrative style felt a little distant for me, and I also wasn't keen on the sections where the author would narrate from the fox's perspective. The relationship development was interesting, and I liked the descriptions of the natural world, but I was left a bit cold. Nothing to do with the author's talent, which is evident, more that the narrative style and storytelling weren't to my taste. A lot of people will love this book, it just wasn't for me.

Thank you to NetGalley and to the publisher, who granted me a free ARC copy in exchange for an honest review.

I REALLY wanted to like this book, but unfortunately it felt so slow paced to me and like nothing was actually happening. I don't feel like any part of it stayed with me after finishing it. I enjoyed the descriptions of nature but didn't find deeper connections and meanings.