In Hovering Flight

July 28, 2008
In this provocative and page-turning debut novel, Hinnefeld (Tell Me Everything and Other Stories
) recounts the life of bird-lover, environmental activist and artist Addie Sturmer Kavanagh. Opening with Addie's death from cancer, and her troublesome dying wish—“clear orders for a brazenly illegal burial”—Hinnefeld's narrative migrates to Addie's days as a college art student, when she fell in love with birds and with the professor teaching her their biology, Tom Kavanagh. The early years of Addie and Tom's romance follows their birding and collaboration on an environmental, antiwar birding book destined to become a classic. Soon enough, though, the birth of their daughter, Scarlet, along with Addie's growing political and environmental awareness, relegate romance to the back seat. As Addie's creative vision shifts from avian homage to political tirade, the effects of her outspoken eco-outrage on her daughter, husband and two closest girlfriends are predictable but authentic, and at times moving. Hinnefeld's drama soars, especially in its depiction of Addie's complicated relationship with Scarlet, who's also trying to find her “wings.”

Starred review from September 1, 2008
Hinnefeld ("Tell Me Everything: And Other Stories") has written a rich first novel about love, loss, and the fragile beauty of nature. When intense, artistic Addie Sturmer enrolls in Professor Tom Kavanagh's "Biology of the Birds" class at rural Burnham College, Tom recognizes in Addie his own ornithological passion and quickly falls in love with her. They marry, setting up house in a cottage in the woods, where Addie paints birds and Tom researches birdsong when he's not teaching. But this idyllic beginning doesn't always mirror their life together. Over the years, Addie becomes increasingly radical in her environmental concerns, and her artwork takes on a gruesome twist. Tom struggles to make Addie happy while being consumed by his own work. Their grown daughter, Scarlet, alternately rebels against her counterculture parents and struggles through her poetry to embrace her conflicting feelings about Addie. But when Addie is in the last stages of cancer, the characters reunite to deal with their demons and to find some measure of peace with each other. Particularly notable for its engrossing details about bird life, this moving book is strongly recommended for all fiction collections.Joy Humphrey, Pepperdine Univ. Law Lib., Malibu, CA

Copyright 2008 Library Journal, LLC Used with permission.