Feather Thief by Kirk Wallace Johnson is aPenguin publication,
This is another book that has sat on my TBR list for an entire year, I added it because it was labeled as true crime and because the reviews were overwhelmingly positive, However, every time I thought about reading it, I changed my mind, because I wasnt sure if I would fully understand the premise, for one thing, and for another, I was afraid it would bore me silly.
It just didnt sound like a topic that would interest me in the least, I decided I should at least give it a try, because all those positive reviews had to mean something, right
I admit I still dont fully understand fly fishing, or the obsession with Salmon fliers.
I still dont have any interest in the sport, and I never will but one thing is for sure I was never bored while reading this book!
It seems there is nothing out there in this world that doesnt have a dark underbelly
The author of this book first learned of Edwin Rist while fly fishing in Mexico, and quickly became as obsessed with this crime as Edwin Rist was with rare bird skins and Salmon fliers.
What are Salmon fliers Apparently, they are a brightly colored lure, made with bird feathers that mimics small fish, which Salmon will snap at.
Victorian, exotic, or rare feathers are highly sought after by collectors and expert tyers,
Edwin Rist, a musician, also happened to be an expert Salmon tyer, To that end, in, Edwin broke into the British Natural History Museum and stolerare bird skins, includingBirds of Paradise.
Once Kirk Wallace Johnson heard about this most unusual heist, he jumped down the rabbit hole with both feet, beginning a long journey for the truth, which culminated in this book.
I dont understand the concept of being an expert tyer if you dont even fly fish, Not only that, it is my understanding that the salmon cant tell the difference anyway, It all seemed like such a tremendous waste, The history, however, that sets these events in motion is utterly fascinating, if a bit peculiar,
The author traces the origins of the feathers and how they came to be in the museum, which is far more interesting than one might think.
From there the book builds into a detective story, then a legal drama, then finally a personal quest for the whole truth and maybe some modicum of justice.
Not to give too much away, but evidently, Rist earned some money from his daring heist, selling some of the feathers/ skins on the black market.
Yes, there really is a black market for these feathers and a lucrative one at that, I knew one could find all manner of things for sale on eBay but vintage bird feathers
While Rist was eventually caught, his legal troubles didnt turn out the way I had anticipated,which is one of the reasons why Johnson felt compelled to draw out as much of the truth as possible.
Some mysteries remain unsolved, but one can take a few educated guesses about what happened and why, though that knowledge doesnt bring about much satisfaction.
Today, Rist uses a different name, and has carved out a unique niche for himself by playing heavy metal music with his flute perhaps the flute he bought with his eBay profits.
Johnson didnt reveal Rist's assumed name, but a simple Google search brought up his infamous Metallica cover of Master of Puppets right awayyou have to see it to believe it.
Rist, who claims to suffer from Asperger's syndrome is clever, educated, talented and skilled, and while his crime is not a violent one, he still did a horrible thing and based on Johnson's exclusive interviews with Rist, he comes off as a greedy, little sociopath who never expressed the proper amount of remorse for his crimes.
Im afraid I did not find him to be sympathetic character at all sorry, not sorry, . .
As to the writing and organization of the book the presentation is very well done, However, the author does take an interesting stance here, He took a risk, in my opinion, by inserting himself into the saga by calling out the flyfishing community for their role in helping to create the atmosphere within in this subculture that makes this crime, and others like it, so alluring and lucrative.
He seems to feel they, too are responsible although his words have probably fallen on deaf ears,
I usually become exasperated if an author refuses to maintain strict neutrality when writing nonfiction, I want the facts, not the author's interpretation of them, or his or her opinion, In this case, however, I can understand why Johnson felt compelled to make such a bold move and he was right in doing so.
Ultimately, this is a fascinating True Crime saga, I found myself immersed in it, more than I ever imagined possible, I learned some interesting history, and a lot about bird feathers/skins, salmon fliers and expert tiers, as well the strange obsessions of men.
The greed that results from these obsessions, of course, is a story as old as man,
While this may not sound like a book that would appeal to a broad audience, it should.
Those familiar with the sport of flyfishing will understand aspects and nuances many of us never will, about this case, but historians, true crime readers, mystery fans and even fans of legal dramas, will find this to be a very compelling story.
As a fly fisherman, fly tier, and former policeman, I found this book to be an absolute home run!
A young "savant", Edwin Rist, had everything going for him.
A brilliant flautist, he and his brother also a savant, discovered the art of tying Atlantic Salmon flies, Throwing themselves into the hobby, they soon discovered the extreme costs and rarity of some of the required feathers.
These feathers come from some of the rarest birds in the world, such as the Resplendent Quetzal, the King Bird of Paradise, the Flame Bowerbird, and the Blue Chatterer.
Due to the rarity of the birds, the world came together and enacted a treaty to protect them, and other rare and endangered species.
It became known as the "CITES" treaty Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species of Wild Fauna and Flora.
It's the basis for the laws prohibiting trade in ivory, for example, as well as many other animals and plants.
Rather than simply using substitute feathers which the majority of us make do with, Edwin concocts a scheme to break into the British Natural History Museum.
The museum housed a vast collection of the birds that Rist needed feathers from, The bird carcasses were collected over hundreds of years, and were being stored for scientific purposes,
To not give the entire book away, Rist burglarizes the museum, and makes away with hundreds of the rare birds.
It seems that he has committed the perfect crime, as he gets away with it for quite a while.
Eventually, people become suspicious of Rist, as he seems to have an unending suppy of the feathers for sale the feathers can be sold, if it can be proven that they were obtained before the CITES treaty went into effect.
He is arrested, but is given a slap on the wrist and released,
Along comes the author, A fascinating man in his own right, Johnson is a modern day Sherlock Holmes, He personifies the word persistent, Through an unending, multiyear investigation, Johnson uncovers much more information, The investigation, and it's revelations, really is quite a fascinating story in itself, Again, I don't want to spoil the book for any readers, so I will stop here!
Not only a story of Rist and his exploits, the book covers many other subjects.
Early explorers searching for unknown species, the whole phenomenon of "feather fashion", the history of salmon fly tying, and the fly tying community itself.
The author melds these subjects into the story seamlessly,
The entire book flows along very well, You cannot help but learn a great deal about many, varied subjects, painlessly, You will find yourself at times pulling for Rist, and yet at times disgusted by his greed, You wonder how the author found the willpower to keep going on in his investigation, when he hits so many dead ends.
All in all, I highly recommend this book, To sportsmen, to crime buffs, to pyschology students, and to anyone else who loves a good mystery,
Thank you to Edelweiss, who provided me a copy of this book in exchange for a fair review.
Reminds me of The Orchid Thief in its readability and theme, This is such a weird but fantastic book, I cant tell you how many times I thought, i mean, were talking about feathers, right Feathers Arent there bigger issues going on in the world right now But it sucks you in amp somehow you find yourself thinking, what happened to those feathers Where did they go What did Edwin do with them So crazy how it twists your mind into actually caring about some feathers and what happened to them.
: The Feather Thief tells the truecrime tale of Edwin Rist robbing the British Museum of Natural History of hundreds of irreplaceable bird skins, and the greed, obsession, and twisted logic that had compelled him to do so.
For me, the most interesting part of this book was the discussion on birds and how knowledge about them led to scientific breakthroughs around sexual selection.
I also enjoyed learning about what museums do with old bird specimens, and how they contribute to scientific progress.
The book also spends a lot of time covering Edwin's hobby of flytying and its community of hobbyists, and I didn't find that very interesting or palatable.
The fact that people would pluck feathers from near extinct or protected birds just to tie a fly that they don't even use to fish many of them don't know how to fish is wasteful and silly.
It was especially hard to read about their cavalier attitudes towards the robbery, explaining away the disappearance of irreplaceable artifacts by asking why museums needed so many of these bird specimens in the first place.
In the end, this book is an interesting tale of an unusual robbery, but my enjoyment of it was curtailed by the greed and attitude of Edwin and his likeminded flytying community.
I find birds to be fascinating and scientific advancement to be of paramount importance, so it was really hard for me to read about people actively working against that just so they can make trinkets.
I absolutely loved this book, It was so fascinating.
It's one of those nonfiction books that makes you reach out for Google countless times, or buy other books because you discovered things you didn't know existed, or you didn't know you were interested.
That's why I find this book so accomplished,
It's about a guy who was obsessed about flytying, and eventually broke into Natural History museum to steal irreplaceable bird species and feathers to use for this purpose.
The story takes us to the times where explorers first started to travel overseas to discover and collect bird species for scientific research.
It then explores how these discoveries lead bird feathers to be used brutally in fashion and hobbies like flytying.
There's a lot of research and information without dumping it on us in a boring way, The book is written in a very engaging language, making the subject matter interesting somehow,
I was definitely fascinated with this crime, as well as reading once more about the limitless human cruelty towards nature.
Even if you think you're not interested in this, I'd urge you to pick it up because you will be interested when you start reading it :
It made me buy other books for sure.
Very well written, very engaging, accomplished look at this crime and history of it, Haven't read something so engrossing all year, What a fascinating and exciting book! I picked this book up for a couple of reading challenges, but I ended up really enjoying it it's surprisingly difficult to find a nonviolent true crime book! Or, actually is it surprising Maybe it's totally expected.
I basically read this in two sittings, one yesterday morning, and one after dinner, It's onlypages long, and it's a fast read the rest of the page count is extensive notes, sources and an index.
Johnson became personally obsessed with the story of a twenty year old flautist who robbed a Natural History Museum in England of irreplaceable dead bird specimens, so he could sell the skins and feathers for an enormous profit, and to supply feathers for his obsessive hobby of flytying the practice of tying fishing flies.
Edwin Rist's story fascinated Johnson not just because it was such a bizarre crime, but because of the underground world it revealed, where other tiers this is how it's spelled, which drives me BONKERS I keep wanting it to be spelled "tyers" chase rarer and rarer feathers, many of which come from endangered bird species that are protected by international treaties.
They scorn replicas, and venerate the Victorian "recipes" for the flies, Most of them do not even fish,
In order to tell the story fully, though, Johnson also tells us about natural history, why the practice of collecting natural specimens is important, and the history of flytying which from its beginning appeared to be a creation of rich white men attempting to elevate themselves above the lowly masses.
Once we've got sufficient background, we hear all about the "heist" I would actually call it a robbery it's not complicated enough for a heist, and its aftermath, in which Johnson actually plays a part in attempting to wrap up the investigation.
The whole thing becomes more of an investigation into human obsession and greed at the expense of knowledge,
One source a scientist Johnson talked to said something that tickled me, so I'll just leave this here:
"'People don't actually fish with this shit, right!' Prum said.
'So what is it about It's about this fixation, this obsession with originality, Well, there's no fuckin' originality in the world! Who are these guys They're dentists from Ohio! What claim do they have to originality in anything!'
When I told him that one of Edwin's customers was in fact a dentist, Prum laughed.
Calming down a little, he went on, 'What I see is a story of the struggle for authenticity, . . to try to make what people are doing meaningful, What they've done is enshrined this in a period where English fishermen were members of a colonial power that ruled the entire globe and could extract fascinating things from it, then sell them in commercial markets.
'But that dream is extinct,' he said, 'That world is gone.
'When I work on feathers,' he added, ' knowledge is a consequence, When I pluck a feather and destroy it, we discover things about the world that nobody knew before, ' By contrast, Edwin and the feather underground were a bunch of historical fetishists, practicing a 'candyass, ridiculous, parasitic activity' that Prum would be glad to see go extinct.
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Worth checking out even if you don't normally like true crime books, There's also quite a bit of history and science to appreciate in here as well, What seems like it would be a really niche subject touches on so many other facets of life and history, like animal poaching and conservation efforts, ladies' fashion, the suffragette movement, the dubious practice of using Aspergers' now known as Autism Spectrum Disorder as a defense, among many other things.
Read Harder Challenge: A book of nonviolent true crime, .