• “Yow discusses 40 species of birds. . . . [and] whets your appetite for knowing what they are up to. . . . [With] stunning black-and-white drawings of each bird by John James Audubon.”–Booklist

• “Who says you have to travel to faraway places to watch birds? The delightful essays in John Yow’s The Armchair Birder take readers on a fascinating voyage of discovery in their own backyards.”
  –Tim Gallagher, author of Falcon Fever and The Grail Bird

• “I enjoyed the dickens out of this book! Drawing on Audubon, Thoreau, Bent, Forbush, and others in order to characterize the avian species, Yow writes with a light-hearted, cocked-head, tongue-in-cheek approach. These essays are gems.”
  –Janet Lembke, author of Dangerous Birds: A Naturalist’s Aviary

• “John Yow’s The Armchair Birder offers details of behavior about our most common birds that will enrich your enjoyment long after establishing who’s who in the backyard and beyond. This delightful book reveals the reality that even the most familiar birds have lives rich with amazing behavior and mystery.”
  –Stephen W. Kress, author The Audubon Guide to Attracting Birds

• “The Armchair Birder will be around for a long time, because it gets to the heart of the matter quickly and stays there. It’s clear, concise, funny, and wise–full of information about birds you probably see often but, if you’re like me, have never really considered before. Once you start reading, you won’t want to stop until you finish because the writing is so fresh and . . . well, good. Yow’s method makes you feel you’re in the company of a knowledgeable friend, sitting on the front porch, hearing great stories that happen to be filled with fascinating facts. Any book that speaks eloquently about the buzzard is a book for me–and you.”
  –Clyde Edgerton

• “This is a most unusual bird book, not one you flip through to find the field marks of a confusing fall sparrow or to confirm a rare sighting. This is a book you will want to sit and read through over and over, not just for the fascinating bird lore, but for the affection and humor that come through in John Yow’s fine writing about our familiar birds.”
  –Bailey White

• “Often humble, droll and gently political with soft sarcasm pointed at policies that have decimated some species’ entire habitat, Yow is the ultimate gentleman birder, highlighting the omnipresent glory and understated miracle of these feathered friends.”

–BookPage