Rosen combines his skills as a mystery novelist (Strike Three You're Dead
) and cultural critic (Psychobabble
) to tell the powerful story of Charlie, a week-old orphaned buffalo who in 2000 was given a temporary home in Santa Fe with animal lovers Roger Brooks and Veryl Goodnight and who then stays for three memorable and sometimes heartbreaking years. As the story unfolds, Rose deftly explores a relationship between Charlie and Brooks that brought out previously unexplored depths of tenderness in the latter, and a devotion surprising for a wild animal: "While Roger read the paper on a lawn chair Charlie would sniff him, or he'd curl up with him for an afternoon siesta." Rosen also uses the couple's own fascinating backgrounds—especially that of Goodnight, a distant relative of Charles and Mary Goodnight, who had helped save the buffalo from extinction in the 1870s—to explore past and present political and wildlife management issues. But the heart of the book is the bond forged over three years between Brooks and his beloved Charlie, whose special combination of "sheer size and gentle disposition," as well as his all-too-short life, make him one of the most memorable characters in recent nature writing. B&w illus. (June)
