MY LIFE WITH WOLVES

Decades spent studying wolves and others in the national parks.

McIntyre, author of many books about the wolves of Yellowstone National Park, including Thinking Like a Wolf (2024), looks back over a life that led him to spend many years observing and recording the behavior of the animals. Now retired and in his 70s, he still lives in a cabin next to the park, spends his mornings getting out to see what the wolves are up to and his afternoons and evenings recording their behavior. Moving chronologically, he records his experiences growing up in Massachusetts in the 1950s and ’60s, where he learned about Yellowstone from The Yogi Bear Show. After a stint in forestry school, where he learned that he didn’t want to “kill trees for a career or be in the business of exploiting nature for human use,” he moved into seasonal work for the National Park Service for decades, working in parks in Alaska in the summer and in the Southwest desert in the winter. When Yellowstone decided to reintroduce wolves to the park in the ’90s, McIntyre found a new passion, and a permanent job. Those curious about his personal life won’t find much here, aside from a couple sentences about a “beautiful blonde woman named Cindy,” with whom he had a long-distance relationship for many years. Even in a book that sets out to tell his own story, he spends almost as much time talking about the wolves he has grown to know and love. “When a lone wolf howls, what I hear is an animal singing the blues,” he writes. McIntyre tells his story with modesty, a natural reserve, a quiet sense of humor, and finely tuned observational skills. A combination of amusing anecdotes and thoughtful interpretation of animal behavior should inspire readers to take a look at their local wildlife, even if it’s a tad tamer.

A contented life on the edge of the wild.