Booklist (May 15, 1980): 1365, 1366.

This review of The Fledgling is an excellent introduction to the novel.

Richardson, Robert D. Henry Thoreau: A Life of the Mind. Berkeley: University of California Press, 1986. Richardson focuses on the inner Thoreau in this treatment of his ideas, aspirations, and achievements.

Schneider, Richard J. Henry David Thoreau. Boston: Twayne, 1987. Schneider explains Thoreau's developing attitudes toward nature, philosophy, society, and writing.

Thoreau, Henry David. Walden. 1854.

Thoreau develops his ideas of the divine unity of nature, the importance of individualism, the importance of seeing the universe in a particular place most richly in Walden. Jane Langton uses these ideas in The Fledgling.