LOOKING FOR THE GOSHAWK. By Conor Mark Jameson.

(2013) 2015 paperback edition. 8vo (129 x 199mm). Pp364. B/w vignettes.

The author, a professional conservationist and an officer of the RSPB, travels (in England, Scotland, Germany and the USA) in search of the wild goshawk, and uses this as the framework around which he builds a searching examination of the species' historical and contemporary position. Interesting, frustrating and irritating - the subject matter is good but I got a bit fed up with his constant harping on about the sins of gamekeepers (when almost all raptors, including goshawks, are still on the increase), but mainly because of his inconsistent use of capitals for animal names. So Otter, Rabbit, Buzzard and Pheasant get capitalised (as though there were only one species of each) while sparrow, crow and woodpecker don't, leading to sentences where the initial letters jump up and down like yo-yos.