The Lure of the Falcon is the story of a young man and the injured kestrel falcon that became his friend and companion -- and eventually accompanied him to war and to POW camps, where she saved his life on at least two occasions. In this remarkable book, Gerald Summers describes his childhood passion for nature, with an exact and loving eye for the characteristics of insects, birds, small mammals and domestic animals -- a passion that eventually fixed itself on Cressida, a small, fiercely independent and remarkably devoted falcon, who came into his life just before he was sent to Tunisia in the Second World War. Summers related the experiences of this bizarre pair -- a young naturalist in uniform and a wild falcon -- who shared together the hardships and dangers of war and the privations of German POW camps. How Cressida saved Summers' life during the Tunisian fighting, how she managed to defeat a Gestapo officer, how she helped her human companion to escape from the Germans and attempt to make his way back to the Allied lines through Italy is all told in a warm, witty and loving book that is reminiscent of vintage Durrell.

More than most nature books, The Lure of the Falcon is about the rare and wonderful relationship that can sometimes grow between a human being and a wild animal -- a relationship of equals, of friends, of creatures who understand each other's point of view. Like Gavin Maxwell's otters and Joy Adamson's Elsa, Gerald Summers' kestrel Cressida is a creature of enduring fascination.