Dan Koeppel’s father Richard is one of the few people who have seen more than 7,000 species of birds. Richard, a doctor, divorced his wife Rosalind when Dan was seven. For the rest of his life, he increasingly distanced himself from his work and other people to pursue his obsession. Dan and his brother were left with Rosalind who went through a string of abusive boyfriends.

Dan decided to attempt to figure out his dad’s birding, but other than the idea that his dad was running from life, none of his answers were very convincing. But while researching and interviewing his dad for this book and accompanying him to South America to see bird number 7,000, Dan and Richard did become closer.

At about that time, Richard suffered some health problems and curbed his birding trips to tackle butterflies.

It was the story of Richard and Dan’s life with mention of birding trips scattered throughout, but with very little meat about birds or birding. And I don’t suspect I would like anyone in the family.