Of Time and Turtles by Sy Montgomery: Book Review

Title: Of Time and Turtles: Mending the World, Shell by Shattered Shell
Author: Sy Montgomery
Illustrator: Matt Patterson
Genre: Memoir, Science
Audience: Adult
Content Warning: Animal injury and death

My Review:

I read and loved Sy Montgomery’s earlier work, How to Be a Good Creature. I loved it so much that I literally read it twice back to back. So my expectations were high as I started this book.

I was a little disappointed but that’s partly because of my own unrealistic expectations.

In the early days of the pandemic, Ms. Montgomery and illustrator/turtle enthusiast Matt Patterson begin volunteering for the Turtle Rescue League. They learn about caring for and rescuing these wise animals but the turtles also teach them how to accept life as it comes and to just keep going, however slowly. That was a lesson we all needed in 2020.

I knew there were groups working to save sea turtles but I didn’t really know that there are groups working to save our terrestrial turtles. Humans are decimating their numbers too. Draining the ponds and wetlands they need to live in, building in their territories and nesting grounds, and driving so fast they literally can’t see us coming. And then there are the heartless jerks who actively aim for them with their vehicles or their crossbows. Yes, crossbows.

There was a lot of interesting information about turtles here. They see or at least process the world slower than we do. They can survive the most horrific, seemingly unsurvivable injuries. The founders of the Rescue League have learned not to declare a turtle dead until it starts to smell. They can even recover from spine injuries that should leave them immobile. They are fascinating creatures.

But toward the end, I started to feel that the book was getting a little repetitious. The turtles were either progressing in their recovery or not. The same nesting grounds were being revisited. The injuries and deaths, though she doesn’t linger too long on them, were getting depressing.

I do recommend reading this but it’s probably a book to be read a chapter at a time rather than all at once.

Synopsis from GoodReads:

National Book Award finalist for The Soul of an Octopus and New York Times bestseller Sy Montgomery turns her journalistic curiosity to the wonder and wisdom of our long-lived cohabitants—turtles—and through their stories of hope and rescue, reveals to us astonishing new perspectives on time and healing.

When acclaimed naturalist Sy Montgomery and wildlife artist Matt Patterson arrive at Turtle Rescue League, they are greeted by hundreds of turtles recovering from injury and illness. Endangered by cars and highways, pollution and poachers, these turtles—with wounds so severe that even veterinarians would have dismissed them as fatal—are given a second chance at life. The League’s founders, Natasha and Alexxia, live by one  Never give up on a turtle.

But why turtles? What is it about them that inspires such devotion? Ancient and unhurried, long-lived and majestic, their lineage stretches back to the time of the dinosaurs. Some live to two hundred years, or longer. Others spend months buried under cold winter water. Montgomery turns to these little understood yet endlessly surprising creatures to probe the eternal  How can we make peace with our time?

In pursuit of the answer, Sy and Matt immerse themselves in the delicate work of protecting turtle nests, incubating eggs, rescuing sea turtles, and releasing hatchlings to their homes in the wild. We follow the snapping turtle Fire Chief on his astonishing journey as he battles against injuries incurred by a truck.

Hopeful and optimistic, Of Time and Turtles is an antidote to the instability of our frenzied world. Elegantly blending science, memoir, and philosophy, and drawing on cultures from across the globe, this compassionate portrait of injured turtles and their determined rescuers invites us all to slow down and slip into turtle time.

Recommended by:

Shelleyrae at Book’d Out

Similar Books:

If you liked Of Time and Turtles: Mending the World, Shell by Shattered Shell, you might also like my reviews of

• Spirals in Time: The Secret Life and Curious Afterlife of Seashells by Helen Scales
• Fathoms: The World in the Whale by Rebecca Giggs
• Braiding Sweetgrass: Indigenous Wisdom, Scientific Knowledge and the Teachings of Plants by Robin Wall Kimmerer

Purchase:

Buy Of Time and Turtles: Mending the World, Shell by Shattered Shell from Malaprop’s Bookstore in beautiful Asheville, NC or

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