Beth Pickering is on the verge of finally capturing the rare deathwhistler bird when Professor Devon Lockley swoops in, stealing both her bird and her imagination like a villain. Albeit a handsome and charming villain, but that’s beside the point. As someone highly educated in the ruthless discipline of ornithology, Beth knows trouble when she sees it, and she is determined to keep her distance from Devon.

For his part, Devon has never been more smitten than when he first set eyes on Professor Beth Pickering. She’s so pretty, so polite, so capable of bringing down a fiery, deadly bird using only her wits. In other words, an angel. Devon understands he must not get close to her, however, since they’re professional rivals.

When a competition to become Birder of the Year by capturing an endangered caladrius bird is announced, Beth and Devon are forced to team up to have any chance of winning. Now keeping their distance becomes a question of one bed or two. But they must take the risk, because fowl play is afoot, and they can’t trust anyone else—for all may be fair in love and war, but this is ornithology.

Magical birds, magical book: this is a love story between fools, feathers, and flames.

Following the announcement of the International Birder of the Year competition, which will grant the winner fame, riches, and tenure, every ornithologist is out for blood. The task: find and catch an endangered and highly dangerous bird before anyone else. The obstacle: every competitor is a field expert, highly motivated, and surprisingly vicious.

Beth, an Oxford professor, wants to be respected enough to delve into her research theory, but with her being a woman in academia and all, tenure is her only hope of doing so. Standing in her way is her biggest rival, Devon the Cambridge professor, who seems to show up in her life solely to make it harder. After an improbable chain of events, the two find themselves allied in the International Birder of the Year competition and not hating it, to the delight of an ornithology publicity group. Romance is good for business, it turns out.

In the process of hunting down a rare, magical bird, we watch ornithologists all over the globe lose their collective marbles but can two, accidentally, also find love? India Holton’s The Ornithologist’s Field Guide to Love is comically chaotic, delightfully absurd, deeply charming, and entirely one-of-a-kind.