Diary of a Citizen Scientist discussion

[Sharman]

Teresa of the New World is my new YA novel set in the dreamscape of the American Southwest in the sixteenth century. I think of this book as a kind of ecofiction--about our connections to land and animals and plants. I'll just announce here that my publisher is doing a giveaway of ten books until March 4.

Teresa of the New World


In 1528, the real-life Spanish conquistador Cabeza de Vaca shipwrecked in the New World, where he lived for eight years as a slave, trader, and shaman. In this weaving of history and myth, the adventurer takes his four-year-old daughter Teresa from their home in coastal Texas to travel with him as a companion. But once Cabeza de Vaca reaches the outposts of New Spain and prepares to return overseas, politics compel him to leave the young girl behind. Her new life is that of a servant in the kitchen of a Spanish official.

Teresa grows up estranged from the magic she knew as a child, when she could speak to the earth and listen to animals. When an epidemic of measles devastates the area, sixteen-year-old Teresa sets off on her own journey, befriending a warhorse abandoned by a Spanish soldier grieving the death of his family, and a Mayan boy, a werejaguar who cannot control his shape-shifting. Because the boy and Teresa carry the measles virus, they are chased by Plague, another shape-shifter who takes on many human forms—Teresa's dead mother, the housekeeper from the Spanish kitchen, and finally Cabeza de Vaca himself.

[Andree]

Thank you for your book, Sharman.

Back at the beginning of the academic year I was reading a book about how to assess and grade special learners. Then I stopped because it was more education lingo and boosterism. But my supervisor asked me to finish it and report to the staff so that she wouldn't have to do it. So I had to read that when I wanted to read your book. I dawdled while reading it and still haven't finished because my supervisor saw it on my desk this past month and said, "Oh! I want to read that!" She had totally forgotten that what she had asked me to do.

So I put it aside without guilt and read what I wanted to read and I am so grateful that you wrote it.

My review is here: Diary of a Citizen Scientist: Chasing Tiger Beetles and Other New Ways of Engaging the World by Sharman Apt Russell

My rating: 5 of 5 stars


I am meandering around the edges of citizen science groups: I will be taking an online class with Project Budburst for my science classes. I am with iNaturalist and Bugguide and have several first sightings of insects for Vermont. But I'm unorganized; darting too and fro without focus. I admire the way Sharman Apt Russell keeps her eye on her objectives while writing and researching other citizen science groups. I will have to try to follow in her footsteps.

This was a delightful book. I read it after reading
Fire Season: Field Notes from a Wilderness Lookout
, so I was somewhat familiar with the Gila Mountains. I explored them on Google Earth (which has become a way to double the time needed to read a book lately).

Sharman's writing style had me chuckling often with the irony of somebody else whose trains of thought seem to be on the same rail as mine ("If I commit to searching a million acres a year, I could do this as a three-year study." Russell, Sharman Apt (2014-11-03). Diary of a Citizen Scientist: Chasing Tiger Beetles and Other New Ways of Engaging the World (Kindle Locations 1150-1151). Oregon State University Press. Kindle Edition) and "It does make me want to cheer, kick up my feet, and flip backwards— something I’d like to be able to do in any case." (Kindle Location 1309)) I learned how to use an insect net, which we have plans on buying for this upcoming season (why are the handles on the nets so long? Doesn't that make them clumsier then they need be?) I shared her frustration in trying to decipher a guidebook description of an insect with the actual insect in front of you.

Sharman writes as a woman and I admire that. I often try to pose as something I am not and I don't have to do that. I should simply write as who I am in language that I use, whether it be scientific nomenclature or our household nicknames for some bugs.

I completely identified with Sharman's excitement at being the first person to see the first instar of the Western Red-bellied Tiger Beetle. We have been the first to report many Lepidoptera in Vermont and the feeling of pride of one's accomplishment cannot be reproduced. One Amazon reviewer, a biologist, disparaged this aspect of Sharman's book and wrote that biology today is team work, not the ground breaking, new species finding work of a generation and more in the past. But I disagree. The excitement is huge. And according to
Diary of a Citizen Scientist: Chasing Tiger Beetles and Other New Ways of Engaging the World
, there are still millions of new insects in the world to be discovered. Hundreds of new species are found every year in the US. I still have hope!

I was comforted by the description of the middle-aged brain but disagreed with the apocalyptic view of ecosystems in the world. We are more optimistic that the world is going to survive even though it will look differently than today (but I'm not saying that we should not get in and battle habitat destruction or not fight for other causes). We may be optimistic because of the rural area that we live in.

I have a list of new citizen science projects to peruse for school. I have new ideas for bug hunting for this summer. I have new knowledge about our tiger beetles so that I can more easily find them instead of just stumble upon them. The importance of scientific bug names was emphasized in this book. My husband and I often have serious disagreements, even arguments, about the names of organisms. Snipe (Vermont) or woodcock (New Hampshire)? We are just beginning to speak Latin to each other now to avoid these rows. Indian Paintbrush or Devil's Paintbrush? And the regional names for Viburnums? We may just make up our own names for those.

Sharman quotes Burroughs from The Gospel of Nature (available for free from Google Books) and I am going to close with this and then put it on my wall:

The nature-lover is not looking for mere facts, but for meanings, for something he can translate into the terms of his own life. He wants facts, but significant facts—luminous facts that throw light upon the ways of animate and inanimate nature.

Thank you, Sharman for this marvelous book.

[Ray]

My review appears here.
https://www.goodreads.com/review/show...

[Sharman]

Rach wrote: "Excited to read your new book, Sharman. I'm glad the book club chose Diary of a Citizen Scientist so that I found out about your writing. Already bought and started on Standing in the Light.

I thi..."

Thanks, Rach! I hope you like Standing in the Light. It's set in the same Gila Valley--and the bird-banding in this book, some eight years ago, is really what got me into citizen science--but quite a different topic. Let me know what you think!

[Sharman]

Andree wrote: "Thank you for your book, Sharman.

Back at the beginning of the academic year I was reading a book about how to assess and grade special learners. Then I stopped because it was more education lingo..."

Wow, Andree, what a lovely discussion of the book! Thanks so much for all your comments and observations. Arguing about names and speaking Latin with your husband. That just sounds so passionate and so much fun.

[Sharman]

Ray wrote: "My review appears here.
https://www.goodreads.com/review/show..."

I left a comment, Ray. Thanks for the review!

[Annis]

I am really excited to read what Ray and Andree have written about Citizen Scientist. It is the one thing I am asking for for my 78th birthday in a couple of weeks. I've been a "bird watcher" since 1947 and in recent years have become something like a citizen scientist in sending my lists to ebirds and Audubon data bases. I am thrilled to think that keeping "nature notes" all these years might mean something too.
Annis Pratt

[Ray]

The e bird list is a citizen science project.