Owls in the Family is one of those books that everyone seems to have read in school except for me. So I read it.
Now I must admit that Farley Mowat has never been a particular favourite of mine, but I haven't been particularly disdainful of his writing, either, nor am I now.
What I found most interesting was this constant sense of "My, how times have changed" as I read. In the midst of the story, which focuses on a boy and his family affectionately living with two pet owls, there's all of this stuff that might well make more modern animal-lovers cringe just a little. Like the random snaring of gophers for sport. Like stealing incubating eggs from wild birds' nests. Like the mass killing of crows by the boy's father after they upset a fishing trip. It's just so odd by today's (particularly urban) sensibility. It seems such an odd contradiction between seeming animal-loving characters who engage in the activities.
Still, it's easy to be gently amused by the crazy shenanigans of those owls! Oh, that Wol! He doesn't seem to realize he's not a human! Har har!
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