THE BEAST IN THE CLOUDS

A story of a star-crossed scientific expedition by two sons of Theodore Roosevelt.

Holt, a journalist who has written several books about overlooked women in history, here turns her attention to an odd gap in the world of natural history—namely, the lack of any formal record of the giant panda, “whose whereabouts, habitat, and behavior were still unknown” other than by anecdote outside China. Indeed, when Kermit and Ted Roosevelt traveled to China in quest of the panda in the late 1920s, it was widely assumed that it was a kind of polar bear, so that “researchers expected the animal to be extraordinarily fierce…and likely one of the most aggressive animals in the world.” As the brothers, working under the aegis of the American Museum of Natural History, venture into country that no non-Chinese visitor has ever seen, they face howling winter storms in 16,000-foot-tall mountains, endure starvation, and lose half of their pack mules and supplies. Such might be the dangers of travel in the wilderness under the best of circumstances, but, Holt clearly establishes, the brothers both lacked the intrepidity of their famed father and sometimes took unnecessary risks. The story becomes grim when members of the expedition kill a rare golden monkey, leaving its baby an orphan that does not live out the night: “They skinned the tiny creature for the museum,” Holt writes, “but its death hung heavily round their heads.” After they finally catch up with a giant panda, their bad luck becomes worse still: The expedition ends in serious illness; both brothers survive but become estranged from one another, with Kermit descending into alcoholism, and both nursing the knowledge that the blustery adventures they report to the public on their homecoming are only part of the story.

Holt’s narrative brims with missteps and tragedy, but it’s a worthy addition to the history of scientific exploration.