cover image Bushmaster: Raymond Ditmars and the Hunt for the World’s Largest Viper

Bushmaster: Raymond Ditmars and the Hunt for the World’s Largest Viper

Dan Eatherley. Skyhorse/Arcade, $24.99 (304p) ISBN 978-1-62872-511-7

Environmental filmmaker Eatherley charts the life and interests of Raymond Ditmars, an early 20th-century snake expert as well as a prolific writer and filmmaker who became the Bronx Zoo’s first curator of reptiles. It is a well-intentioned effort that delves into the natural landscape and the unique environments in which bushmasters, the world’s largest vipers, often thrive. Eatherley traces the herpetologist’s searches for bushmasters in both the United States and South America. The book is a biography and a scientific narrative, yet the author never manages to capture or keep his audience’s full attention. Eatherley dutifully recalls Ditmars’s experiences with different kinds of snakes, writing about how Ditmars “would never forget the turmoil of impressions etched on his brain” during an encounter as a teenager, “the snake’s length far exceeding that suggested by its weight; the keeled scales lending the skin a rasp-like quality; the waxy sheen of the animal; the blunt head; and, set above pinkish jowls, the reddish-brown eyes with their elliptical black pupils.” But the work lacks a real hook and readers might find it difficult to be similarly enraptured. Eatherley’s occasional references to himself and behind-the-scenes research details reveal much about the scientific process, but they are not enough to carry the rest of the story. Photos. [em](June) [/em]