Ring of Bright Water

Forever after you read A Ring of Bright Water, the beauty, wonder, and humor of this book will gently surface with a ring of bright ripples in the waters of you mind. I am never able to remember this book without simultaneously wanting to laugh and to cry-and always with a sense of awed wonder. This is the true story of Gavin's befriending of otters (or perhaps we should say of the otters' decision to befriend Gavin.) In one scene, on the first night Gavin has one of the otters in his home, the otter carefully watches Gavin get into bed and pull the covers to his chin. The otter then crawls in beside Gavin, lies on its back, and pulls the covers to its own chin. Other scenes describe Gavin's losing efforts to make certain parts of his cottage off limits to otters. Gavin never for the rest of his life produced prose that so translucently coveys the beauty of the waters around his cottage, or the sense of his own evolving life and emotions. Reading this book is giving a gift to yourself. It is one a dozen that I always look for used to give to friends.

Despite being a book written 40 years ago, the delightful stories are perfect to read over and over. If you only know it as 'the book about the pet otter', it also has dozens of other little vingettes in it. Marvelous, a classic!

This book has been a favorite of mine for years. Maxwell exceeds at conveying deep personal emotion, and this book is suffused with the joy he felt during his first few years with his otters Mij and Edal.Fans of this book should take pains to search for the two out-of-print sequels: "The Rocks Remain" and "Raven, Seek Thy Brother". Neither is as joyful or cohesive as "Ring", but you will indeed find out what the life of a reclusive-yet-famous nature writer can be like. I also highly recommend Maxwell's autobiography of his childhood, "The House of Elrig".

A wonderful account of Gavin Maxwell's fascination with the otter. An equally wonderful account of the beauties of the Western Highlands from a perspective rarely available.Highly recommended to anyone who loves nature, or otters, or animals in general, or Scotland and the Highlands and Islands!This book left me wanting more - lots more - including more on the life and times of Gavin Maxwell and all his other books!

In Ring of Bright Water, a man discovers to his delight the endearing, playful, and intelligent nature of otters. The first third of the book traces his introduction to Camusfearna, an invented name for a real place on the Scottish coast. This part of the book drags a little if you're waiting impatiently to get to the otters, but there are some shining spots in which Maxwell describes life where the green hills and cascading falls meet a wind-swept sea; for instance, he describes in welcome detail how incomputable numbers of elvers (eels) struggle mightily up the burn (river) and falls near his remote country home, the eels facing stalwartly a long, difficult battle coming at the end of unending miles of swimming through hunted waters. The rest of the book brings a smile, because it recounts Maxwell's introduction to the antics and fascinating viewpoint of otters, whom he finds are "extremely bad at doing nothing . . . (being) either asleep or entirely absorbed at play". The pages where the unprepared author learns just how raucous, intelligent, joyous, persistent, and dextrous otters can be, especially in situations requiring the author and his slithery new companion to be inconspicuous, are alone well worth the price of the book. This book should be on the reading list of any pet lover, especially those who love ferrets. There are a few places where we are sobered and saddened by the fragility of our loved ones in the face of unexpected danger. This book begs the question of whether it is correct to domesticate more wild animals, but does not address the question signficantly. The book seems a little incomplete in that it ends by the author simply ceasing to tell the story, which leaves one with a feeling of lack of resolution. One might like to know how the second half of Edal's life went, but then one might have to read of her end, and it might be better to end with the images of her playing good naturedly on the sofa by the fireplace.