[Book Review]The Backyard Bird Chronicles by Amy Tan

By Sarah Denison

Each winter morning throughout my childhood began the same: I would sit at the kitchen table and gaze out of the window at the bare branches of the redbud tree with its wooden bird feeder. Over my oatmeal, I would watch the feathered visitors pick out their favorite seeds while I flipped through the slim field guide of North American birds that was kept on the windowsill. Over time, I learned to call the birds by name: mourning dove, black-capped chickadee, tufted titmouse. Though I don’t have that kitchen table anymore, I still have that field guide and I still remain fascinated by the joys of identifying my neighboring birds. 

Unlike me, Amy Tan, renowned author of The Joy Luck Club, didn’t begin birding until she was in her sixties, when she turned to nature “for peace”. In 2016, during a time when she felt overwhelmed at the state of the world, she took a nature drawing class. Then, what started as the simple enjoyment of watching birds in her backyard, turned into a full-blown obsession involving more formal classes on drawing birds, birding field trips, and hundreds of dollars worth of live mealworms each month. The Covid pandemic clinched this obsession forcing her to stay home, where she spent hours observing, drawing, and journaling about her backyard birds each day. Over the course of the next several years of bird watching, she kept journals of her observations, questions, and sketches. Her newest book, The Backyard Bird Chronicles, is a curated collection of these birding journals. Through it, she hopes to inspire others to care for and protect birds.

As the title implies, The Backyard Bird Chronicles appeals first to a niche market of backyard birders like me. One must have at least a mild interest in birds to enjoy this book, but expert birders might find some of the entries lacking or obvious. However, such readers will enjoy reading the often funny descriptions of Tan’s observations, such as the account of mixing ghost pepper powder into suet in an unsuccessful attempt to deter rats or attempting to get an Anna’s hummingbird to feed from her hand. Also enjoyable are the researched bird facts sprinkled throughout the text, such as how birds have a unique vocal organ called a syrinx (the structure that allows them to sing) or how baby birds have weird special lips that aid their parents in feeding them.

The passages, written in Tan’s trademark fluid style, are easy to read, wholesome, and cozy; although the book is not without its issues. It might have worked better if the journal entries had been rewritten as a collection of essays. As it is, the repetition of anecdote after anecdote grows tiresome, not unlike David Sedaris’ published diaries Theft by Finding. No matter how witty or skilled the writer, published journals like this lack an overarching structure to break up the monotony and tedium of quotidian entries. Because of this, The Backyard Bird Chronicles will struggle to hold the interest of even the most dedicated readers for very long. 

That said, the book is not without value. Accompanying the journal entries are some of Tan’s own delicate sketches, such as that of fledgling scrub jays learning how to eat or the various expressions made by a great horned owl. These drawings elevate the book to something lovely. It would make an excellent book to keep on your coffee table or in a guest room. 

Or perhaps this book is best read one entry at a time sitting at the kitchen table in the morning as you sip your coffee and gaze out the window – a daily reminder to slow down and take joy in the wildlife around you. As Tan notes in the Preface, “Unlike fiction, I didn’t need to hope the story pulled together. The story was the moment in front of me, one day, one page, one sketch.”

Recommended for readers who relished the everyday tidbits of joy in Ross Gay’s Book of Delights or the mix of nature and memoir in The Sound of a Wild Snail Eating by Elisabeth Tova Bailey. 

Sarah Denison is a writer from Kentucky. She has worked with three literary journals including Kelp Journal. She enjoys memoirs, literary fiction, poetry, mysteries, science nonfiction, and cozy sci-fi. Her favorite place to read is in a tent by flashlight.