Findings: Essays on the Natural and Unnatural World Paperback – Illustrated, March 20, 2007

Jamie leads you on nature and natural history adventures. She "sees'" what everyone else misses. If you didn't already know she is a poet, you can sense it from her descriptions. Like her later book Sightlines, this one is worth reading more than once to try to understand how and what she sees and how she captures details. There are lessons to be learned about how to improve your own travels.

One of my favorite poets The writing in Jamie’s book is beautiful and such a pleasure to read

This book transports you to Scotland and is one of the most lyrical, poignant and well written books I've ever had the pleasure to read. I wish I could attend one of her lecture series at St. Andrews University. I'll be buying more of her books immediately. Truly wonderful.

My book group loved Findings. I was studying and reading for assignments and found this book a welcome distraction. I could have been on the island!

In a word, wonderful. Full of wonders. A completely fresh way to look at the world and our place in it

Jamie writes with sobriety, sensitivity and grace about the natural world and our human place within it. Her book is sparsely illustrated with delicate black-and-white photographs that picture many of her topics. She chronicles visits to places ranging from her own backyard to the Orkney Islands to Edinburgh and beyond, with a marked preference for those wilder spots where the human imprint may still be seen, but nature prevails.In the Central Highlands she explores a glen scattered with "abandoned shielings," small stone huts used by villagers for thousands of years as summer homes while they pastured their cattle on the fresh upland grass, and she reflects on a by-gone way of life. "Up here they made milk, butter and cheese, and it was women's work. What a loss that seems now: a time when women were guaranteed a place in the wider landscape, our own place in the hills." Living on and with the land is important to her; she pays attention to the seasons, the birds and fish, the trees and other plants, going about in all kinds of weather, walking, biking or sailing. At times she is with her children or friends; often she is alone. Always she strives to be alert, to catch that moment of revelation, "to glance up from my own everyday business, to see the osprey or the peregrine going about hers."The book opens with a chapter called "Darkness and Light" about the winter solstice, magical scenes of the half light of northern Scotland, her own desire "to enter into the dark for the love of its textures and wild intimacy," and her pilgrimage to Maes Howe, a Neolithic stone cairn built with a long passageway arranged so that each evening, for a few days around the solstice, a ray from the setting midwinter sun shines through to light the chambered vault, like a promise, like a kiss. Nearly a dozen chapters later Jamie's book closes with a joyous dolphin sighting off the coast of Tobermory, a celebration of life. Along the way she helps us see the value and vulnerability of an ancient, yet ever new, world now threatened by contemporary technology and human carelessness.Buy this book, read it, scribble down lines you want to share with others, talk about them, reflect on them, enjoy a renewed connection with nature as well as a heightened awareness of our need to protect it.

The ability to describe ones surroundings in a meaningful and transportive way is rare. The author’s telling of her experiences with her surroundings produced beautiful images and tranquility. The chapters are short so try one.

Jamie has wit, knowledge, sharp prose: delightful read

What did I like about this author; Everything - the way she paints word pictures so sharp and clear - I am with her, right there. I am now the owner of three of her books, so I guess she speaks to me. I get the feeling she is a free spirit - likes to explore, has a sharp eye, likes the wild off-beat places. I am reading her 'Sightlines' for the second time and I can only repeat the cover quote ' The outer world flew open like a door, and I wondered, what is it ........ ?I have lent Findings to a friend - will I ever get it back?

The structure of each essay is carefully thought through and themes rolled back and forth throughout. Vivid details brought Scotland to life for me and the clever descriptions,meant that I would read, smile and then re read a phrase again. Highly recommended I can't wait to read more.

This is a gentle book, which explores aspects of both the natural and man-made environments. Scottish to the core, but with an eye for things that are more world-wide, Kathleen Jamie has a wonderful turn of phrase and a eye for detail.If you like contemplative, slow moving, walks through interesting places then this may be the book for you. There are no major cliffs to be scales, no desperate snowy landscapes, just accessible places where most readers could walk, but most probably wont.The contemplation of darkness, peregrines, the endless call of invisible corncrakes and a collection of preserved anatomical specimens all provide a landscape for exploration. (With this last topic being, surprisingly, one of the best sections in the book).I don't think this book says anything particularly new, but it does use some rather wonderful prose to explore familiar ground.Highly recommended.

It felt like the whole book was a walkabout with wonderful company - humane, thoughtful, evocative - a great time out in times when travel is not possible. Loved the language.There were a few typos but that just made it more likeable!!

Findings by Kathleen Jamie is a beautiful, lyrical journey into the world of a poet. Jamie's prose captures moments from her own life and patient observation of the world aroound her in equal measure. What makes this slim volume stand out from so many others is the writer's effortless ability to find the right words to convey her feelings. Less is always more and the apposite word and image to show the reader a hawk in flight or the view above the capital are used without forcing the language. Instead it is as if Jamie has been gifted with a greater store of words than the average mortal. There are parts that I would rather not have seen, exhibits in a museum that had less appeal for me than for Jamie but the wanderings over hill and dale, the sightings of birds, the findings of the title, did make this a very special little book.