SOURCE: Solomon, Andy. “The Scientist is a Romantic.” Boston Globe (30 November 1997): G2.

In the following review of The Sky, the Stars, the Wilderness, Solomon extols Bass's expression of love for and understanding of the natural landscape in which the writer's stories are set.

Rick Bass embodies a fortunate confluence of virtues. From his earliest story collection, The Watch, he's professed a devout love for the land. As a petroleum geologist, he also possesses a scientific comprehension of the land. And as a writer of superb descriptive gifts, he has few equals in describing it.

Bass the storyteller weds art to understanding. More than a writer, he is an interpreter. But petroleum geologists bore into their ground obliquely. That's what Bass does in the two long stories and novella constituting his luminous new book [The Sky, the Stars, the Wilderness]. “The Myth of Bears” is a contemporary fable set...