I missed my bus stop. Even though this book starts by telling you the ending—the bird, the po'ouli, is going to go extinct—somehow I got so engrossed in the story that I kept right on going through downtown Honolulu on the No. 56 bus when I was supposed to get off near Fort Street Mall.

Powell, who lives and works in Massachusetts, says he was inspired to write this chronicle of a Hawaii bird that was discovered and lost in the last 30 years after reading a short newspaper article.

“;There's something wrong with this,”; he thought. “;Surely, we humans must acknowledge the passing with something more than just a couple of paragraphs.”;

Maybe in Hawaii we do take such passings too lightly. After all, there are more endangered and threatened species here than anywhere else in the country. But we hear little about the heroic work that is being done to change the situation. Great efforts are being made, millions of dollars are being spent and heroic (and sometimes mundane) battles are being fought every year to change this tide of extinction. But how much do we even hear about these struggles going on in our rain forests or even our own back yards?

Powell's gift to Hawaii is to trace the story of the po'ouli, which was first discovered in the 1970s in some of the wettest, most remote parts of eastern Maui.

When he picks up the story a few years later, only three known members of the species are left—and they live in different areas where they are unlikely to come in contact with each other for breeding. Scientists racing against time, but slowed by bureaucratic regulations that take years to put into place, have to decide on the best course of saving the species. Do they do nothing and hope for the best? Do they fence off the remote forested habitats to protect the birds from invading pigs and other dangers? Do they try to bring the birds together in the wilderness? Or do they take the birds into captivity for a risky breeding program in a state facility?

As Powell traces the efforts to save the po'ouli (the name means “;black-faced”;), he widens his research to talk about the bigger picture of extinction in Hawaii and around the world. He retells the well-known stories of the carrier pigeon, the buffalo and other animals that have gone extinct through the workings of man. The dangers are real and growing every day, and the author does a good job of showing the fate of one bird species unique to Maui as part of a much bigger global picture.

There are no good answers here. Though trying to cooperate, well-intentioned scientists, volunteers and their government and private agencies clash over and over on the best way to succeed. The arguments for and against captive breeding programs, in particular, remain controversial and unsettled.

In the end, the efforts were all too little, too late for the po'ouli, Powell concludes. By the time the species was discovered, so few birds were left that chances of recovery were never good. The missteps and infighting didn't help. However, Powell argues that it's not too late to apply the lessons learned.

“;Species that are similarly endangered from around the world can't wait for us to get around to taking action,”; he says. “;If we can learn from history and understand why we failed to save this species, we have a better chance to succeed with others.”;