“I love this memoir, The Crane Wife by CJ Hauser,” says Bluedot’s Digital Production Coordinator and Good Libations columnist Julia Cooper, who adds, “I even assigned an excerpt for the writing class I teach at Emerson.”
Julia recommended this particular favorite of hers during a conversation about EarthWatch expeditions because, as she explains, “In the memoir's titular essay, CJ goes on an Earthwatch expedition to research whooping cranes after abruptly calling off her engagement. The memoir is told through a series of essays with various themes, often encountering topics of the environment.” The author was a professor of Julia’s at Colgate — “she mostly writes speculative fiction that deals with themes of generational conflict, the environment, and complicated families,” Julia says. “Her memoir came about when an essay she wrote, “The Crane Wife,” was published in the Paris Review and got a lot of attention. It's a charming, funny, and heart wrenching read that I wholeheartedly recommend.”
