Travels with bears

Not--John McPhee wisely prefers his travels with bears visible but far in the distance.  The bear parts are the best in the book--

There is an old adage that when a pine needle drops in the forest the eagle will see it fall; the deer will hear it when it hits the ground; the bear will smell it.


Coming Into the Country is a rambling, three part book about Alaska. It doesn't try to be an encyclopedia or a reference work, but simply the story of The Country, as told through the minds and hearts of people who live there.  The first part recounted the author's journey via canoe and kayak on the Salmon river in the Bear Mountain range, and it was good, solid travel adventure.  I liked very much.

But the rest of the book didn't agree with me so well.  It was stories of people, mostly--little natural history but a lot of human stories about life and living and death and walking a razors edge in a cold, lonely country.  What kind of person builds a cabin on a stream a thousand miles from the nearest outpost, and lives there through the arctic winter?  What people come to live in the town of Eagle, population 300 or so, and why do they stay?

Usually I love this sort of storytelling (Blue Highways and Travels With Charley are two of my favorite books to re-read) but this one just seemed to go on and on, dragging without power to charm or amuse.  Possibly it's my fault, not the book's.  I just got tired of it.