Don Moser (1932–2013)

NOT ON AR READING LIST

Not listed in the Accelerated Reading curriculum program.

A Heart to the Hawks by Don Moser (1975), hardcover (no jacket), 208 pages. A library discard from Bryant High School in rough condition.

A vintage novel, if not a classic, it sure should be considered one by now, originally published in 1975. I personally would say this book was written for mature 14 year olds or older. This started out as a really cute, true-blue coming of age story of 14 year old Michael "Mike" Harrington set in Cleveland, Ohio, in the summer of 1946. Mike and his buddy were age 14, so boobs were a big deal...not unusual...but a big, big deal. I actually found it quite humorous.

He saw the beginning of the pond that provided field work for his hobby in the study of bugs, and the local woods, being destroyed and replaced with shopping centers and neighborhoods. Then, he saw his hawk, which he had saved and adopted, electrocuted by electrical lines recently replaced by the destruction of those woods and the pond.

Here, I felt the author went off the deep end with the boy’s activism. Creating a bomb to blowup one of the heavy equipment machinery? I thought this was a bit much. The story was suddenly a little less believable. Otherwise, Don Moser is a really awesome visual writer. His descriptions of the pond in this book were spot on and brought back so many of my own memories of our late-night gar fishing off the dock on Cow Bayou. And the boys running around at night doing what "boys" do, reminded me of me and my sisters, with other neighborhood kids, roaming around after dark and doing what "girls" do...with the creative influence of boys leading us, creating just a little harmless trouble, like Mike and his buddy. The story is completely relatable, until the end, of course.

Michael is a young boy in tune with himself and in touch with nature. A couple of his favorite books were "Happy Hunting-Grounds" by Kermit Roosevelt and "African Game Trails" by Theodore Roosevelt. He was interested in science, mainly biology. John Corvoran, his best friend, was also interested in science, but he leaned more toward chemistry.

The boys headed to Basecamp for a campout at the pond, about a quarter mile from Mike’s house, which had been their campout for at least the past five years. They spent many nights out there alone collecting nighttime bug specimens to study at home in aquaria in their bedrooms and basement. They've built a stone circle for their fire, made a log table of sorts, gathered a couple chairs and odds and ends from the vacant farmhouses in the area. They even secretly smoked 3" cured grapevines, just like cigarettes.

"For a time they sat and smoked and looked at over the smooth water, watching the dusk come on. The spring chorus of mating amphibians was already reduced from the throbbing tempo of April and May, but with the approach of darkness a sprinkling of night sounds it was beginning. The twang of green frogs, the chirring notes of the cricket frogs, the occasional peeping of a hyla, and over all, the high meeting trill of a lone American toad." (p. 28)

The nightlife on the pond in the story was very much the nightlife on Cow Bayou back in 1970’s when we were growing up. The crickets sounding, frogs croaking and cicadas trilling. The night noises were so incredibly loud, but we strangely never saw them. Lightening bugs flashing. The beam of the dock light glowing over the water and exposing swimmers just below the surface. Alligator gars and spotted gars, which was what we were after, swimming into the light, rolling on top and swimming away. The unique, stinky smell of muddy bayou water. Mosquitoes buzzing around our heads, doing their best to eat us alive, forcing us to keep sprayed from head to toe. This was a Saturday night on Cow Bayou!

In Mike's neighborhood, just exactly like in our neighborhood on Cow Bayou, they began tearing down the woods, making way for new homes. Progress couldn’t, and can’t, be stopped because you can’t make people care about the small little things in nature. It’s been paid for and there’s money to be made by someone. But, Mike wanted to stop it, or at least make them pay. His friend suggested just putting sugar in the gas tank. That would have been a more believable story by two teenage boys, who weren’t really criminals, than creating a pipe-bomb to blow up the CAT. The only thing that stunt accomplished was to nearly cost Mike his life, and now the boys had to go to court and were considered juvenile delinquents. Great story, not a great ending!

P. 137: "All of this... All the places that you go in the places you want to go, they'll be finished, kaput. They will be instead factories and highways and houses and people. The air will stink, the water will stink, and whatever little land isn't covered with concrete will have a keep-out sign on it."

Well, folks, here it is now, 2021. We have arrived!

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SCIENCE EXPERIMENT TO TRY WITH GRANDKIDS: Moth "paint" - couple bottles of beer, some molasses, and brown sugar. Let that ferment in a crock for a couple of days. Paint onto a tree and moths will be attracted to it overnight. They will be so full that they can't fly away. That’s okay. Leave them alone. They are only sleeping and will fly away later. (p. 121)… (plus d'informations)