There's a movement or trend in nature writing occurring, as we find we have failed many nonhuman species including plant life (the mushroom books multiply) to find nature wherever we can whether it's in (if we are lucky to have one) our backyards or in the empty lot of an urban environment or in the many green spaces that infiltrate urban, suburban and rural environments. No longer do nature writers need to seek out the spectacular or the isolated. Instead as this book shows we can share the wonders that occur right before our eyes or ears or nose.

Renkl has been writing about her favorite place to observe life in its many forms for quite some time for the New York Times and here she organizes these observations over the period of a year, recounting in beautiful sometimes bittersweet prose what she observes during specific seasons in her backyard. At the same time as most of the short essays focus on hyperlocal eco-happenings, we get glimpses of family life, her own memories and experiences along with hints of human-centric political shenanigans. Ultimately, she argues observing the natural world allows humans sanctuary from such dreary matters but at the same time calls on us to become stewards. All of this rendered with detailed illustrations that make it very much a book you want to savor and relish.

Currently reading this a chapter per week with my mom. Love the weekly insights that correspond to the seasons. Growing up in Georgia, I can readily relate to many of the stories. Thank you to NetGalley and Spiegel & Grau.

I adore Margaret Renkl (and we share a hometown). This book is so beautiful that I purchased several copies as gifts. It's an absolutely stunning meditation on the natural world.

Many thanks to the author, publisher, and NetGalley for sharing this book with me.

Really enjoyed this one! Well written and great reading, especially while sitting in your own backyard!!

This is a beautiful book for anyone who loves nature; or for anyone who wants to grow that appreciation. Told in bite-sized chapters with beautiful prose and filled with whimsical illustrations, I tried to savor this as long as possible.

The chapter formatting would also make this one a great companion for carrying around (or leaving in the bathroom) when you only have time here and there to read.

I highly recommend picking this one up if you are interested at all!

Just like in her first book, Renkl works magic with her words. If you love nature writing like me, you won't want to miss any of Renkl's writing! The ultimate comfort read is how she weaves a gorgeous memoir together with the wonder of the natural world. She reminds you to slow down and take a closer look at the world around you, to examine how nature fits into your life and how you fit into nature. I can't recommend this book enough!

I am a sucker for nature writing especially if it goes season by season--it is my weakness. This book is a beautiful dive into a year in the life of a woman in central Tennessee (Nashville). I loved reading these little mini essays that cover each week in the year; this book has so much wisdom tucked into it that I may need to read it a few times before it all sinks in. The writing is lovely, it is easy to read and unburdened with academic terms or lofty ideals. Reading this book feels like a meditation on life and time reminding us that what we have is not permanent and nothing is promised, including tomorrow. My one complaint while reading was about the lack to dates to help locate you in the year but by the end of the book I got it: this book isn't a linear progression of a year but a circular one with layers of time and lifecycles built up that represent a year. I am not able to get outside of linear thinking BUT reading this book and thinking more cyclical and circular, I can just see around the edges of my linear time. Perhaps with more of my own time and wisdom in the future I will come back to this book and read it with a different light. Regardless, its a treasure and I highly recommend it for the nature lovers out there.

This book was such a delight. I really felt seen when reading this book. It is going to stay on my physical bookshelf for a long time.

“The Comfort of Crows: A Backyard Year” by New York Times opinion writer Margaret Renkl is a paean to close and gentle observation. Over the course of the Covid pandemic that reached the US in early 2020, Renkl took the opportunity to use the unstructured time to look carefully at what was happening in her yard in a Nashville suburb.

Renkl is that neighbor whose yard is a glorious mess of grass and wildflowers, despite the norms of the neighborhood. She doesn’t hesitate to advocate as best she can for the wildlife around her and the environmental practices that are causing animals to lose their natural habitats.

“The Comfort of Crows” is structured as a sort of book of days, or, more accurately, a book of weeks, 52 chapters, one for each week of the year, with titles like “How to Catch a Fox,” “Ephemeral,” and “My Life in Mice.” Her brother Billy Renkl, a professional artist, provides strikingly beautiful illustrations for each chapter. “We’ve been collaborating our entire lives,” she explained at a book signing I attended.

Although her observations focus on plants and wildlife, people enter the story as well - neighbors, friends, relatives. Her boys come home from college during the pandemic. Her husband Haywood watches coyotes from the front steps during sleepless nights. Friends come and go.

Renkl’s prose is lyrical and deeply personal. There’s a poignant quality to writing done during such a strange time, when all the old routines were overturned, leaving people to figure out what’s important to keep, what can be dispensed with. Renkl weighs the price nature pays for the determination of people like her to live on land that was, until fairly recently, undeveloped.
But attachment to home, their family’s lived experiences, and the memories created there have a powerful pull. Her home and its land are well beloved.

Readers who enjoy a humanistic approach to writing about the natural world will enjoy “The Comfort of Crows,” and are likely to find themselves looking more closely at the world around them as they go about their lives. It’s a reminder to slow down, even when the world isn’t in turmoil. To stop and find the worlds that lie adjacent to our own but that are often missed in the hustle and bustle of life.

Margaret's lyrical writing makes anyone want to sit in their own yard and notice the phenological changes that occur throughout our days. Many a writer has done something similar, taken something they are intimately used to seeing on a daily basis and challenged their own knowledge about the landscape and Renkl is no different.

Magical, beautifully written, tender, and thought provoking about how our lives intertwine so delicately with the natural world if we pay attention.

Thanks to NetGalley for the ARC of this book. This was such a lovely memoir and meditation on a year of observations of the natural world, even within the suburbs of a larger city. The writing was gorgeous, and the art between chapters was lovely. I liked the mix of lengths and topics, really a beautiful book for any nature lover.

I'm so EXCITED by this book. . .it brings joy, warning, hope, remedy, gentle chiding, parental reminders, friendly nudges, forlorn whispers, rooted wisdom, cautious disquiet, and chest deep chortles. . .52 snippets of all that good stuff to start each of week of your year to remind you of the life you are living. In the middle of. Wherever you are. Start there. . .Week 1 of Winter. . .read through it. I'd never really considered it that way - that each week of the year has a name, a role. Week 5 of Spring is different than Week 13 of Summer or Week 2 of Fall. Check out your living place - no matter how you came to it, settle in and get to know it. Follow the lead of this brilliant author, and her brother the illustrator whose artwork accompanies hers. . .

You'll find all that nature offers in these pages: birds of all sorts, bumblebees, flowers, dirt, worms, skinks, feathers, nests, foxes, nuts, trees, roots, spiders, fungi, migrating individuals and groups, kids, partners, neighbors, red wasps, storms, life, death, birth, writing! oh the writing!, wonderings, wishes, happiness, geese, sadness, water, more birds, crows, of course, crows. . .the author writes from her Tennessee home and backyard, so there is a southern voice woven throughout. (I listened and read. The author narrates the book, which makes it even more compelling. . .my maternal line is southern women raised so my ears are particularly tuned to that key. . .)

It's absolutely a gift to all of us - my copy (right by my calendar) will be carefully followed and considered as the year grows older and moves through its beautiful seasons. 5+ stars, shining on this big beautiful world.

*A sincere thank you to Margaret Renkl, Spiegel & Grau, and NetGalley for an ARC to read and independently review.*

Margaret Renkl, a contributor to The New York Times, has penned a book that’s equal parts Bailey White and E.O. Wilson: a book about nature with a lyrical, folksy quality. What a joy to read! The illustrations by Renkl’s talented brother, Billy Renkl, are simply the cherry on top for this wonderful book and its beautiful vignettes and poems from all four seasons.

In the interest of full disclosure, I received this book from NetGalley and Minerva in exchange for an honest review.

"The Comfort of Crows" by Margaret Renkl is an interesting gem, offering a year-long journey through the seasons in her backyard. Renkl's fifty-two chapters serve as a captivating devotional, portraying the joys and sorrows found in the natural world.

From the resourceful crow observed on New Year's Day to the lingering bluebirds of December, Renkl beautifully captures the cyclical nature of life and the ever-changing landscapes of her surroundings. The book becomes a celebration of the ongoing pleasures of nature and a poignant reflection on the inevitability of change.

Woven into the narrative are glimpses of the changing rhythms of human life—the departure of grown children, echoes of generations past in bird songs, and the evolving city and country landscapes. Renkl's observations serve as a profound exploration of the connections between the natural world and the human experience.

The addition of fifty-two original color artworks by the author's brother, Billy Renkl, enhances the visual and emotional impact of the book. "The Comfort of Crows" is not just a literary work; it is a deeply moving experience that resonates with those who appreciate the beauty and fragility of the world. Renkl's words, accompanied by Billy Renkl's artwork, create a harmonious blend that makes this book a cherished and enriching read.

Thank you to Spiegel & Grau for the advanced reader copy for a review via NetGalley.

The book wasn’t my pace but I still think it is lovely. I think if I had a print copy and could enjoy the illustrations, I would have a lot more fun reading it. It can be read a chapter a week and serve as a great companion book for nature gazing. Gave me a feeling of NYT Weekender articles and Modern Love bits. Lovely, and will probably be an even better read for me sometime in the future.

In THE COMFORT OF CROWS, Margaret Renkl highlights the gift of noticing the natural world throughout a year.

I'm in awe of her knowledge of plants and animals and how she makes these observations such a natural extension to her days. The book is structured around the four seasons, one chapter each week, although I happily read several in a setting. One chapter might introduce us to her desk mates, another covers a recitation of animals she has tended over the years, and she is quick to find analogies and metaphors.

Renkl strikes a balance of mourning the changes that are afoot due to climate change and human intervention while also deriving hope and joy in the midst. I also echoed her tension of how she knows she ought not to interfere in the natural world but sometimes being unable to resist the pull. Alongside this all is an acknowledgement of change: in family dynamics, in neighborhoods, throughout the earth. This account time and again helped me to pause and derive new wonder and appreciation for the natural world.

There is also artwork throughout, so while I read a digital copy, the physical book would be a lovely gift to yourself or others to pore over the beautiful collages in vivid color. 

(I received a digital ARC from the publisher via NetGalley in exchange for my honest review.)

Author Margaret Renkle offers comfort in the form of a literary devotional, committing one essay to each of the 52 weeks in a year. Within these essays -- some of which read as prose poetry, some as praise songs, some as hermit crab essays in the form of how-to's, others as personal essays wherein she weaves observations of the natural world around her Tennessee home with reflections upon her life as she grows older and her children have left the nest. All contain her keen attention to nature and life cycles, including her own. My favorite: "Loving the Unloved Animals" pays homage to creatures such as vultures, rat snakes, red bats, and opossums. "Let us rejoice in the pink-nosed, pink-fingered opossum, her silvery pouch full of babies no bigger than a honey bee." Another favorite: "Praise Song for Sleeping Bees." Like a religious devotional, The Comfort of Crows is a reflection meant to focus the reader's heart. In this time of ecological grief, Renkl and her book encourage us to take heart and find joy in the natural world. And she encourages by example: "The very least I owe my wild neighbors is a willingness to witness their struggle, to compensate for their losses in every way I can, and to speak on their behalf about all the ways I can't." 
[Thanks to Spiegel and Grau and NetGalley for an opportunity to read an advanced reader copy and share my opinion of this book.]

Renkl manages to reflect deeply on what it means to live a life while trying to maintain a balance both with nature and with ones self. Overall I found it to be a comforting read that somehow managed to make my own relatively small life feel more spacious. Renkl's reverence for the beauty in the world that is all around us, and indeed in what many would consider the mundane is a balm. I found myself looking at the everyday things in my own life with more tenderness than before.
Overall a comforting and insightful read that would make a lovely stocking filler for any reflective nature lovers out there.

While the writing is pretty, the essays aren't particularly engaging. It reads like a journal, which is good if that's what the reader is looking for. Someone who wants to dip in and out of a book would probably enjoy this meandering collection.