This new memoir from Minnesota essayist Sue Leaf is not really about bullheads. Or even the Bullhead Queen, a raft her son used to use as a teenager in the lazy Minnesota summers. Instead, this book offers bite-sized musings on life; the natural world surrounding her home on Pioneer Lake; and problems with the environment as they relate to her Christian faith. The Bullhead Queen leads the reader through the freezes and thaws of the seasons, sprinkled with annual celebrations, both of the church and her family.
As the head of her local Audubon chapter, Leaf threads her keen observations about and interactions with birds through the book. Closely linking the seasons with the liturgical calendar, she demonstrates how surprisingly interconnected the two can be. She does the same in her natural observations, using her background as a biologist to add scientific tidbits to the simple beauties she finds in nature. Leaf’s calm and restorative prose provides a perfect read with your morning coffee.
–Becki Iverson
The Bullhead Queen
University of Minnesota Press, $24.95
Author Sue Leaf will read from and sign copies of her book at the Barnes and Noble in Maple Grove on Nov. 14 at noon. Other U of M Press authors reading and signing books at the store that day include Al Papas Jr. at 10 a.m. (Gophers Illustrated), and Armand Peterson at 1 p.m. (Vikings Reader). Read the MOQ review of these two books here.
Barnes and Noble
8040 Wedgewood Lane, Maple Grove, MN 55369
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