Coming up in 2012: A cool new book about hunting

At the risk of appearing cruel, I've got a great new book I want to tell you about. What's cruel about it? The book doesn't come out until June. The good news is you can pre-order it.

"Call of the Mild: Learning to Hunt My Own Dinner" (Grand Central Publishing) is Lily Raff McCaulou's tale of moving from New York City to Bend, Oregon, to take a job as a newspaper reporter.

There are two things she discovers very quickly in Bend: One is her husband-to-be, Scott, and the other is that hunting isn't at all what she had always thought it was, having grown up in an uber-liberal suburb of Washington, D.C.

Scott introduces Lily to fly fishing, and Lily decides on her own that she'd also like to try hunting, which Scott doesn't do. So without a specific mentor to inspire and guide her, she goes for it.

Wow - totally intrepid. I love her already.

This book is an important read for many segments of the hunting community for many reasons, the first being the most obvious:

Every hunter I know loves the vicarious thrill of reliving his or her own learning experiences through the tales of another new hunter. When that hunter is an articulate adult, so much the better.

I've also met about a dozen new huntresses this year who I'm pretty sure will relate to this tale as well, because they're still in the thick of learning this strange new world.

It's not just the vicarious thrill that's important here, though: Lily's tale demonstrates just how hard it is to break into hunting when you don't know a soul who hunts.

Some of this difficulty is inevitable: We all have to go through learning how to shoot straight, learning when to shoot, trying out gear, and learning how to process game.

But some of the difficulty could be avoided if state wildlife agencies, non-profits and even gun stores recognized that not all new hunters were raised in hunting families, that they really do need everything spelled out explicitly - and patiently.

For example, Lily goes to three gun shops before she finds someone who respects her wishes (she wants to shoot a 20 gauge), patiently explains things like how to shoulder a gun, and recommends a place to practice shooting and find mentors.

And because she decided to start hunting after the one and only adult hunter ed class that year has been held, she ends up in a children's course. Really? One adult class per year?

Another audience that needs to read this book is politically conservative hunters, even though they'll chafe at some of what Lily has to say. (I don't know if she would call herself a liberal, but she's clear that her upbringing was, and she reminds me of a lot of new hunters I've met who come from similar backgrounds.)

Why should they read this? In general, I believe it's important to understand the thought processes of people you disagree with, but more importantly, we need to understand that there are plenty of people from liberal backgrounds who can embrace guns and hunting if we'd just stop berating their politics long enough to let them in.

Really. It's OK. We don't all have to belch "Barack" to be hunters.

Finally, hunting organizations need to hear what Lily has to say.

She quickly becomes an advocate for hunting, and being a journalist, she really knows how to do the research to back up her opinions. But she also holds up a mirror to some hunter-based organizations. She really wanted to join some, but found so many of their messages to be off-putting, particularly those geared toward trophy measurement and record-keeping.

I think all hunters who are active in these organizations know that funding conservation is an important, if not the most important, thing that most of them do. But it sure doesn't look that way to Lily, and if that's the message she's getting from these organizations, you can bet non-hunters don't see them in any better light. I know it's not just Lily who feels this way: I work with a lot of new hunters, and they ask the exact same kinds of questions she does.

Now, I may have just made this book sound like broccoli - something you should read, not necessarily something you want to read - but I promise you it's not. The reason I'm reviewing this book is that when Hank passed it to me (he got an early copy for review), I devoured it in two evenings. And unlike some books I've read, this one didn't make me swear even once - even though I don't agree with all of her positions on hunting issues.

Lily is curious, intrepid, smart and articulate. She's a fantastic addition to the hunting community, and I think you'll enjoy her story as much as I have.

© Holly A. Heyser 2011