I love Canada Geese and make a hobby of watching the ones near my house migrate and nest every year. Because of this, I really wanted to like The Skein and the Pair by Kathy Flanary Nelson, however I was quite disappointed by the execution of the novel.

The story follows two goose and gander couples - Annika and Nathaniel and Sophie and Seth - mated for life, who migrate to a nesting spot near the home of a human couple, the titular Pair: Jayden and Desiree. I liked the premise of the book and the parallel relationships between the geese and their human observers, but I found many flaws in this work that even the charming story could not redeem.

I liked the anthropomorphic qualities of the geese, but at times they were drawn as just too human - quoting popular radio songs, reading Shakespeare, and giving each other high fives. The story seemed inclined to focus on juxtaposing the lives of humans and geese, and these behaviors tended to take the geese away from being animals. Also, the dialog of the humans Jayden and Desiree seemed very unnatural. The two almost always used each others names when talking and rarely spoke using contractions. It seemed a very choppy and overly formal way for a married couple to converse.

Even aside from these issues, I have to point out that the editing in this book was extremely poor. Every chapter - and almost every page of text - contained errors with punctuation, grammar, or spelling. At multiple points even main character's names were spelled wrong, and the repeated misplacement of quotation marks made reading difficult, as dialog and description were indistinguishable. I was given a copy of this book for review by the author, but it was not marked as a pre-publication or advance review copy in any way, thus I assume the text I was given was a final version. I strongly feel that this book is in need of a professional editor. I did, for the most part, enjoy the story and with revision I could see The Skein and the Pair produced as a charming story for young readers. ( )

The Skein and the Pair is the story of a group of geese who have mated for life. When they fly west they land near a pond where they are observed by a loving couple. The relationship between the geese and their mate parallels the relationship between the couple. Respect is show to the human by the geese using human like thoughts, and gestures to acknowledge their thanks for help received from the humans. Although this is a simple story, I have learned a lot about geese that I had not known before. ( )