Alaska Bear Tales

by Larry Kaniut

317 pages, Paperback

Reviews

[KathyC · Rating 5 out of 5]

This book is what it says, a collection of stories about unfortunate bear encounters. It’s a good selection of some of the best of the many bear stories of its day. I grew up in Alaska, so this book was riveting to me. It may have been the first book (published in the early 1980’s) that devoted itself exclusively to bear stories, so it was a hit when it first came out.
Bear stories were the biggest, scariest ones Alaskans tended to tell when I was growing up, so a few of these were familiar to me. There are many true hair-raising bear stories and this book only scratched the surface, the reason for quite a few sequels after this. I can imagine after the publication of this book, the author got deluged with people sharing their own stories.
Recommended I suppose if you’re looking for authentic (and frequently gory) bear stories. Someone commented they thought some of the stories must have been exaggerated. Without being present for any of them, I would say they’re probably not. My father had a few gory stories from his time as a big-game guide in the Nelchina AK area and the truth of them tended to sound larger than life.

[DAVID · Rating 3 out of 5]

My daughter gave me this book. She inherited it from a sweet old lady who thought she might enjoy it. She passed it on. Some of the stories are hard to believe but miracles do happen. Don't mess with one of Mother Nature's amazing animals.