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Alan Conrad
"Loneliness isn't the same thing for those who are
solitary....Being alone is no problem for us at all.
By ourselves on a mountain, in a great forest, or
out on the sea, we're happiest, for those are
places where we feel at home. It's when we're
surrounded by people who don't understand us
and won't accept that we can't be like them, that
we feel what we call loneliness."
- Christopher Stone in The Birdcatcher
solitary....Being alone is no problem for us at all.
By ourselves on a mountain, in a great forest, or
out on the sea, we're happiest, for those are
places where we feel at home. It's when we're
surrounded by people who don't understand us
and won't accept that we can't be like them, that
we feel what we call loneliness."
- Christopher Stone in The Birdcatcher
This is the site of Alan Conrad, author of The Birdcatcher, a novel intended to be
a declaration of independence for shy solitary people.
To anyone hoping to learn something about me, I apologize. I'm one of those who
don't reveal much. As Christopher Stone says in The Birdcatcher, we're like deer
in a forest, happiest and most confident when we're least seen.
Should you read The Birdcatcher? Well, it's not a book for everyone. I wrote it
mostly for those of you who are shy and solitary by nature - for the introverted, the
social phobic, the love-shy, HSPs, and those with autism, Asperger's Syndrome,
etc - but it's not just about shyness.
It's about the entire world - about our relationship to other species, and wild
places - a natural view of the natural world - and it's about the bizarre nature of an
unnatural world ruled by an unnatural god - money. It's about being burnt out but
still working because you need money, and it's about falling in love when you never
wanted to fall in love again.
It's a search for reality in an unreal world, a search for solutions where there
appear to be none. It's about trying to see where we're all headed in this rushing
current of change at the beginning of the 21st century.
So if you're one of those people who are interested in everything - in microbes
and galaxies, history and art, economics and music, love and war, then, whether
you're shy or not, The Birdcatcher might be a book for you.
Although the book is all of that, it was not perceived to be commercially viable by
the North American publishing industry. But if financial success is all important,
then books like The Birdcatcher will never exist. That's why you can download it
free from the PDF links on the left, or the others above.
a declaration of independence for shy solitary people.
To anyone hoping to learn something about me, I apologize. I'm one of those who
don't reveal much. As Christopher Stone says in The Birdcatcher, we're like deer
in a forest, happiest and most confident when we're least seen.
Should you read The Birdcatcher? Well, it's not a book for everyone. I wrote it
mostly for those of you who are shy and solitary by nature - for the introverted, the
social phobic, the love-shy, HSPs, and those with autism, Asperger's Syndrome,
etc - but it's not just about shyness.
It's about the entire world - about our relationship to other species, and wild
places - a natural view of the natural world - and it's about the bizarre nature of an
unnatural world ruled by an unnatural god - money. It's about being burnt out but
still working because you need money, and it's about falling in love when you never
wanted to fall in love again.
It's a search for reality in an unreal world, a search for solutions where there
appear to be none. It's about trying to see where we're all headed in this rushing
current of change at the beginning of the 21st century.
So if you're one of those people who are interested in everything - in microbes
and galaxies, history and art, economics and music, love and war, then, whether
you're shy or not, The Birdcatcher might be a book for you.
Although the book is all of that, it was not perceived to be commercially viable by
the North American publishing industry. But if financial success is all important,
then books like The Birdcatcher will never exist. That's why you can download it
free from the PDF links on the left, or the others above.
PHOTOGRAPHS
Lone Pine - copyright Alan Conrad
White Tailed Deer - courtesy of the Pennsylvania Game Commission - Joe Kosack/PGC Photo - www.pgc.state.us
Lone Pine - copyright Alan Conrad
White Tailed Deer - courtesy of the Pennsylvania Game Commission - Joe Kosack/PGC Photo - www.pgc.state.us
