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Title: The Elephant's Secret Sense: The Hidden Life of the Wild Herds of Africa
ISBN: 0226616746
Author:
Caitlin O'Connell
Publicate Date: 2008-09-01
Publish: 2008-09-01
List Price: $15.00
Average Customer Rating: 4.5
Format: Paperback
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Amazon Lowest New Price: $9.21
Amazon Lowest Used Price: $8.84
Amazon Merchant Price: $11.70
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| Customer Review: |
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1: Inspired by Elephants' Ears
One would expect that a book written by a research associate at Stanford University on elephant communication would be boring and pedantic, but not so with Caitlin O'Connell's The Elephant's Secret Sense. The daughter of a doctor, whose earliest memories found her carrying her father's medical bag in hopes that he would use his tools to examine her ears, O'Connell grew up to study the enormous ears and hearing systems that encompass the elephant from head to toe. Her studies led her in a quest to help the Namibian farmers, resettled from South Africa during apartheid, by using sound to protect their farms from hungry elephants.
O'Connell's work combines the suspense of a mystery writer with the lyrical prose of a travel writer, and reveals her compassion for all living things. In her book, she chronicles her adventures and misadventures as she strives to understand how elephants communicate with each other within their African environment.
In the Caprivi, violent death is as much a part of the landscape as the capricious nature of rain. Nobody knows when it will come or how much to expect, but in the end it always comes. Death can snatch people away without warning--for example, a leopard stealing into a hut leaving a faceless victim, a croc seizing a laundress off the riverbank, or an elephant using its powerful knuckle to smash the ribs of a hapless person lost in the forest...And a neighbor may disappear simply for being from the wrong tribe, or from the cold sweat of the ever-present malarial fever, or even from an unexpected twist in the night, silencing the cries of an infant.
O'Connell traveled between two settings in Africa, one in the wild with elephants, lions, rhinos, crocodiles, and elands, and one in the villages of Namibia with unfamiliar residents, corrupt officials, and compassionate reserve stewards. As well, she dealt with various educational institutions in the US. Throughout the book, she shows the reader the contrasts between the different cultures.
...When it came time to leave the Caprivi, I was stricken yet freed. Which way did I feel? Which way should I go? How could I tease apart these feelings?...How is it that I had come to grieve for this land, for the animals, and for these people? How did I let it consume me? How could I put things in perspective? After leaving and gaining some distance, would I ever be able to return? I wanted desperately to help, yet my visions for the inevitability of failure paralyzed me. In the end, had I really helped these people?
Including pictures of many of the elephants she studied, O'Connell shows how a researcher can quickly become attached to the animal's personalities almost to the point of anthropomorphism. But she maintains the balance necessary to study the wild animals without interfering too much in their environment.
After reading this book, one will undoubtedly want to read more about preserving the last wild herds in Africa and support O'Connell and her husband, Tim Rodwell in promoting elephant conservation and scientific understanding around the world. For those interested in science and ecology, this very readable book also serves as an inspiration to the next generation of researchers.
by Susan M. Andrus
for Story Circle Book Reviews
reviewing books by, for, and about women
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2: Nonfiction with style, suspense of literary action thriller
This book is filled with vivid characters both animal and human, heart-pounding adventure, and fascinating scientific and political information. Anyone intrigued with animal intelligence and personalities will be rewarded with this and much more. O'Connell recounts amazing adventures in a style that's both lyrically descriptive and gritty in details that bring the reader into the different world of today's Africa. Without an ounce of bragging, she reveals herself and her husband to be courageous, quirky and very smart action heroes that you'd enjoy seeing on the silver screen. Their heartfelt devotion to their quest - and each other - is compelling and very satisfying.
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3: Intriguing African Adventure
Last spring I attended a book signing and lecture by the author in Alexandria, Virginia at which Dr. O'Connell described her research into elephant communication and some of the adventures and misadventures she experienced during her years in Africa. I purchased the book and found it immensely satisfying. This talented young woman illustrates the principle of serendipity paying real scientific dividends. Acting on an informed hunch based on earlier work with insects, she embarked on years of exhaustive field research which demonstrated that elephants are able to communicate over substantial distances by means of subsonic sound waves propagated seismically through the ground. Field research does not occur under the controlled circumstances of the laboratory, and Dr. O'Connell sketches in the background with fascinating details of interactions with the people and wildlife of Namibia. In addition to achieving a seminal scientific discovery, she worked with local villagers to mitigate the impact of elephants foraging on their crops and mapped the way for shifting the local view of elephants to one of valued resource rather than as pests. This compelling memoir allows the reader to participate vicariously in the experiences of this courageous young woman as scientist, naturalist and good-will ambassador in southern Africa.
Phillip Peterson, Alexandria VA
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4: Would have been better as a magazine article
This is a frustrating book . . . just good enough to keep reading, but never really satisfying. If it had been a magazine article (say in "The Atlantic") centered firmly on the topic suggested by the book's title -- i.e., the unusual and surprising ability of elephants to sense and communicate via seismic vibrations -- I probably would have thoroughly enjoyed it (especially if it had also received the editing of a good magazine). Instead, the book goes well beyond the subject announced on its cover, so much so that it becomes more like a memoir of the author's 12+ years of research into elephant behavior, especially her 4+ years in the field in Namibia. Thus, the book is by no means limited to how she first formulated and then proved her hypothesis concerning elephants' seismic communication. In addition, we read a great deal about her work with African governments and villagers towards finding non-lethal ways of keeping elephants from destroying gardens and crops, about some quite personal experiences and anecdotes from her life in Africa, and, more generally, about other problems in contemporary Africa such as AIDs, poaching, and the nigh-intractable conflict between conservation and maximum economic return for natives. All of this is interesting; it certainly makes for a more exciting life than I have led over the past 14 years, and to a degree I envy Ms. O'Connell. But even so, I have better uses for my reading time, and in deciding how to allocate my reading time I wish I could rely on how publishers describe their wares. I purchased the book because I was interested in the subject of elephant communication, not because I wanted to read the memoir of a naturalist's career in Africa. To a certain extent, the publisher, Free Press, has engaged in a bait-and-switch.
Is this sloppy inability to limit what is essentially a work of reporting to the subject at hand, instead allowing the writer to wander off into various and sundry other matters that were encountered as a reporter in the field, a by-product of the "New Journalism"? In any event, I have encountered the phenomenon all too frequently in recent years. I might add that the writing is rather ordinary, and the book could have benefited from a stronger editorial hand. That, too, is a phenomenon far too frequently encountered.
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5: Not Animals in Translation...
I was expecting a book similar to Temple Grandin's Animals in Translation. Unfortunately, this book is very much unlike that book. I expected the bulk of this book to focus specifically on elephant communication, but that is not the case. Much time is spent on African conservation in general and the history of certain African areas where she was stationed. When I bought the book, it was not to read about local tribes or their politics, it was to read about elephant communication. Not saying the other topics aren't interesting, but if I wanted to read about those, I would have bought a book specifically on that. Making things worse, her style of writing is very disjointed and skips around.
There are not many books that I don't finish reading, but this was one of them. I was very much looking forward to reading this book based on the reviews. Not sure why there was such a disconnect. Maybe it's expectations. If you are expecting a more in-depth book specifically on elephant communication, with lots of scientific detail, this isn't it.
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