At the age of 26, following a long illness and bout of depression that cut short his postgraduate studies, English journalist William Fiennes thought that life had little left to offer him. Inspired to travel after his illness, Fiennes followed the migratory path of the snow goose from the Gulf of Mexico north up the Hudson Bay to the Canadian Arctic.

Fiennes combines a passionate field study with his personal journal and memoirs, eloquently describing a long journey that took him through urban and rural North America. Observing this culture with foreign eyes, while also studying a migratory species, Fiennes draws interesting parallels between the human desire to travel and explore and the impulse to return home. As he recounts his quest, readers are led to ponder that for humans, like the geese, returning home is as profound and important as the journey itself.

What binds this study together and places the book above the average bird-watching journal and into the genre of satisfying travel literature is Fiennes’ excellent writing. His honest descriptions and personal tone are reminiscent of Bruce Chatwin and Paul Theroux, and, like his mentors, Fiennes writes with poetic detail and a wide-ranging intellect, balancing the weight of researched data and historical study with a visual, poetic eye.

Despite its undoubted future popularity with bird and nature enthusiasts, The Snow Geese is ultimately about the excitement and amazement that can be found in travel, if the traveller is open to the experience.