Hey, it's NPR's Book of the Day. I'm Andrew Limbaugh. Okay, I'd completely forgotten that

Sunday was Father's Day until I got an ad on Instagram reminding me to buy, like, a grill

or whatever for my dad, which, first off, he has one already, and secondly, my mom is the one

who usually uses it. But gender roles

in advertising aside, it's as good a time as any to give a shout out to the dads out there,

and a reminder to give them their due, especially if they're still around. In a bit, we'll hear from

a writer who wrote a memoir about her dad, who has dementia, and who was also a full-on spy.

And she gets from him all these fascinating stories that she keeps close to her, which is similar to what Heather MacDonald did.

Her acclaimed 2015 memoir, Ages for Hawk, is about the time she spent training a hawk after her father's son and death,

and she uses the time to ruminate on her dad and about life and death.

She talked to here and now as Robin Young after the book came out and said that training

the hawk tied her to the world again and made her feel like nothing was completely lost.

In the U.S., national security news can feel far away from daily life.

Distant wars, murky conflicts, diplomacy behind closed doors.

On our new show, Sources and Methods, NPR reporters on the ground bring you stories of real people,

helping you understand why distant events matter here at home.

Listen to sources and methods on the NPR app or wherever you get your podcasts.

To read Helen McDonald's new memoir is to have every cell of your body awake and alive.

You watch the words go by like, well, like a hawk.

A.2s for Hawk tells how after her beloved father suddenly dies,

Helen decides to raise and train one of the most vicious birds of prey, the goss hawk.

Helen is a falconer. She's hawked before, and we readers learn what that is.

...