Shadow Mountain: A Memoir of Wolves, a Woman, and the Wild (Paperback)
After forming an intense bond with Natasha, a wolf cub she raised as part of her undergraduate research, Renée Askins was inspired to found the Wolf Fund. As head of this grassroots organization, she made it her goal to restore wolves to Yellowstone National Park, where they had been eradicated by man over seventy years before. In this intimate account, Askins recounts her courageous fifteen-year campaign, wrangling along the way with Western ranchers and their political allies in Washington, enduring death threats, and surviving the anguish of illegal wolf slayings to ensure that her dream of restoring Yellowstone’s ecological balance would one day be realized. Told in powerful, first-person narrative, Shadow Mountain is the awe-inspiring story of her mission and her impassioned meditation on our connection to the wild.
Renée Askins is a writer, naturalist, environmental activist, and founder of the Wolf Fund. Educated at Kalamazoo College and Yale University, she has written and lectured extensively on the relationship between humans, animals, and the wild. She has been profiled in Time, Audubon, The New York Times, Life, People, and Parade, and her writing has been featured in Harper's Magazine and in the anthology Intimate Nature: The Bond Between Women and Animals. Askins has received awards from the Outdoor Writers of America, the Student Conservation Association, and the Wyoming Wildlife Federation. She lives in Wilson, Wyoming, with her husband, Tom Rush, and their daughter, four dogs, and three parakeets.
“The wolves of North America have their Jane Goodall, and her name is Renée Askins…. An eloquent plea for nature unrestrained.” —Outside Magazine
“Delightful…fun to read. The seamless way Askins weaves the natural world into her narrative brings to mind Terry Tempest Williams’s memoir Refuge.” —The New York Times Book Review
“Demonstrates the kind of deep natural wisdom and sense of awe at the wild that has distinguished writers like Edwin Muir, Annie Dillard, and Aldo Leopold….Wonderfully poignant.”—BookPage
“Renée Askins is a modern-day hero, a woman of tremendous courage and creativity. . . . Never have we needed these words more. This book is a quiet revolution.” –Terry Tempest Williams, author of Refuge and Leap
“Delightful…fun to read. The seamless way Askins weaves the natural world into her narrative brings to mind Terry Tempest Williams’s memoir Refuge.” —The New York Times Book Review
“Demonstrates the kind of deep natural wisdom and sense of awe at the wild that has distinguished writers like Edwin Muir, Annie Dillard, and Aldo Leopold….Wonderfully poignant.”—BookPage
“Renée Askins is a modern-day hero, a woman of tremendous courage and creativity. . . . Never have we needed these words more. This book is a quiet revolution.” –Terry Tempest Williams, author of Refuge and Leap