ELISABETH TOVA BAILEY’s natural history/memoir, The Sound of a Wild Snail Eating, recounts her year-long observations of a wild Maine woodland snail. The true story of her interspecies relationship is reaching a general international audience of both genders and all ages and is finding special homes in the fields of literature, natural history, medical humanities, and education.

Bailey’s essays and short stories have been published in The Yale Journal for Humanities in Medicine, The Missouri Review, Northwest Review, and the Sycamore Review. She has received the William Saroyan International Prize for Nonfiction, the John Burroughs Medal Award for Distinguished Natural History, a National Outdoor Book Award in Natural History Literature, several Pushcart Prize nominations, and a Notable Essay Listing in Best American Essays. Bailey is on the Writers Council for the National Writing Project. She lives in Maine.

View photos here.
Read a letter from the author here.

Classification Chart of Snail and Human:

“A snail has an interesting life; its courtship is remarkable, its various natural abilities are astounding, it has a memory, and, just like humans, it likes a comfortable place to sleep and very good food.” —Elisabeth Tova Bailey