The promotional blurb calls this Companion “both a practical handbook for amateurs and a handy reference for seasoned birders.” It is basically a reference manual of eclectic scope that covers topics related to North American birds (north of Mexico), with entries arranged alphabetically. Examples? Try “drake,” “Hutton,” “names, colloquial,” “skimmer,” “wreck,” and “xanthochromatism,” to name but six that my eyes lit upon in a random opening of pages. On page xii, the author explains his two-fold desires in writing such an encyclopedia: to have at his fingertips a book that could answer numerous technical to trivial questions about birds, and a longing for nontechnical accounts of the basic elements of birdlife that could be read for pleasure as well as information. An earlier iteration of the Companion was published in 1982, but this 2004 edition is greatly updated and expanded.