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Reindeer Moon #2
The Animal Wife
Elizabeth Marshall Thomas's first novel, an international best seller, drew praise of the highest kind. "[Reindeer Moon] deserves a place of distinction, right at the head of the line, of the great series of 'historical' novels," wrote the late Joseph Campbell. It was published in fourteen languages and won a Hemingway Award Citation.
The Animal Wife may well rank by its side, for this new novel shares half a world with its predecessor. Whereas Reindeer Moon saw the life of prehistoric humankind through the eyes of Yanan, a gifted but rebellious woman, The Animal Wife, which takes place a few years later, is narrated by young Kori, a marvelous hunter, as prodigious in the chase as he is ignorant of the ways of women. Yet Kori too is confined by his society, interdependent as it is with the world of animals.
Elizabeth Marshall Thomas's greatest talent is to identify with, to become, an animal, as a great hunter does; and animals provide Kori's people with nearly all their religious and spiritual symbols, nearly all their tools and weapons, nearly everything, except desire. Kori is full of desire and aspiration—the aspiration to be as great a hunter as his father, Swift; the desire for a woman of his own.
Few readers of this book will ever forget the scene in which Kori, hunting in strange country for the site of a mysterious campfire, finds, swimming in a pond, what he imagines to be an animal but which turns out to be a naked woman; acting on instinct only, he instantly abducts her and makes her his wife.
The Animal Wife may well rank by its side, for this new novel shares half a world with its predecessor. Whereas Reindeer Moon saw the life of prehistoric humankind through the eyes of Yanan, a gifted but rebellious woman, The Animal Wife, which takes place a few years later, is narrated by young Kori, a marvelous hunter, as prodigious in the chase as he is ignorant of the ways of women. Yet Kori too is confined by his society, interdependent as it is with the world of animals.
Elizabeth Marshall Thomas's greatest talent is to identify with, to become, an animal, as a great hunter does; and animals provide Kori's people with nearly all their religious and spiritual symbols, nearly all their tools and weapons, nearly everything, except desire. Kori is full of desire and aspiration—the aspiration to be as great a hunter as his father, Swift; the desire for a woman of his own.
Few readers of this book will ever forget the scene in which Kori, hunting in strange country for the site of a mysterious campfire, finds, swimming in a pond, what he imagines to be an animal but which turns out to be a naked woman; acting on instinct only, he instantly abducts her and makes her his wife.
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First published January 1, 1990
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About the author
Elizabeth Marshall Thomas
46 books254 followersElizabeth Marshall Thomas is the author of The Harmless People, a non fiction work about the Kung Bushmen of southwestern Africa, and of Reindeer Moon, a novel about the paleolithic hunter gatherers of Siberia, both of which were tremendous international successes. She lives in New Hampshire.
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Displaying 1 - 30 of 44 reviews
March 2, 2018
3.5 – 4 stars
Society, whether based on the family, the tribe, or even the nation, is a basic element of what makes us human. It is something that provides numerous advantages as the many can often accomplish tasks that the few would find impossible, not to mention the benefits of mutual support and community that society can provide. Nonetheless this human trait of grouping ourselves together has also led to many of the basic evils inherent in our nature and perhaps the greatest of these is its creation of ‘the Other’, anyone outside of our immediate community who becomes equal parts alluring mystery and offensive demon. Mary Marshall Thomas tackles this very issue in _The Animal Wife_, the sequel to her Paleolithic historical-fantasy Reindeer Moon
As the title indicates, Thomas takes as her model the folktales of the animal wife, a woman who is really an animal masquerading as a human who becomes the lover or wife of a man. In the end the relationship ends up causing some kind of difficulty or problem, usually revolving around human social taboos, and then she disappears back into the wilderness, taking her children by the man with her. In this case the woman in question (aptly named ‘Muskrat’ by her new ‘husband’) is not actually an animal in disguise, though from the perspective of her husband and his people this might as well be the case. The main players of the tale are closely related to the characters in the previous novel, many of them making a re-appearance. This time our main character is Kori, the son of Swift (the Mammoth Hunter chieftain and shaman from the previous book) who comes to live with his father’s people and in the process stumbles upon a strange woman he sees swimming in the lake near his father’s winter hunting grounds. Driven by a compulsion even he doesn’t understand, Kori eschews all caution and abducts the woman, claiming her as a pseudo-wife. At first his tribe is unhappy with Kori’s rash action, but when no immediate reprisals from the woman’s tribe are forthcoming they come to accept that this slave is now a part of their daily lives.
Slave is not really too severe a word to use for Muskrat’s role amongst these people. While Kori does not treat her particularly harshly (at least compared to how all women seem to have been treated in this society), and even comes to feel that he loves her, she is not a true member of his tribe and thus cannot claim any of their rights. Muskrat is often left hungry even when others are well-fed since no one wishes to share with her and is always expected to do the tasks no one else wishes to do regardless of how difficult or even dangerous they may be. I don’t think there is any way to get around discussing this book without acknowledging the issue of rape. Indeed rape is clearly an underlying theme of this novel as it is a basic fact that Kori rapes Muskrat (in both the older sense of ‘stole her from her people’ as well as the more common usage regarding non-consensual sex) and ultimately fathers a child on her. Surprisingly Thomas is still able to have Kori be more than just a villain (at least I found it so) perhaps partially due to the mores of the time as expressed by Thomas, though perhaps more as a result of Muskrat’s seemingly pragmatic acceptance of her position as well as the fact that Kori himself doesn’t seem to even see that she is anything other than his wife…though this may be quibbling and I feel I am treading on dangerous ground here. Suffice it to say that Kori ends up coming across more as selfish and clueless as opposed to truly villainous or evil and Muskrat is far more than merely a victim.
Strange to say even though most of the characters act in ways that a modern reader is likely to find at least mildly reprehensible I found many of them to be sympathetic and enjoyable (though perhaps I’m just a natural misanthrope). Swift, the patriarchal chieftain of the tribe, for all of his macho bluster and self-regarding opinions, is a man of astute observations who can be as congenial as he is self-interested. Kori’s Uncle Andriki is a level-headed and jovial man usually able to head off conflict in the tribe or smooth over ruffled feathers with a few well-placed words. Kori himself, the narrator and ostensible main character of the novel, is often frustratingly naïve and selfish, though he does ultimately come across as someone with a good heart for all of his faults. Muskrat, the animal wife herself and perhaps the true centre of the tale, is fascinating. Often as much a mystery to the reader as she is to Kori and his people through her inability to communicate with them, she is soon seen to be a woman of strength and resilience who has enough room in her heart even for the man who took her from her people and the son he fathers upon her.
Thomas does an excellent job here, as she did in her previous book, with bringing her vision of a Paleolithic world to life. Her mammoth hunters are a fascinating group of people with a complex culture centred around the cycles of nature and the importance of family and familial relationships. The roles of male and female are sharply defined not only in the daily life of the people, but, in their minds at least, also in the wider world and cosmos beyond them. Of central importance to the tale are the female and male principles (spiritually and mystically personified in the figures of Ohun and the Bear) each of which has its own proper sphere of influence and to whom the shamans would plead for aid and mercy. From the supernatural world this intertwining of male and female extended to the human and each gender ‘owned’ some central aspect of the human world which came under their particular care, whether it was the lodges and hunting grounds of men, or the family lineages and mysteries of birth of women. Within the tribe, the primary component of human society in the novel, one’s rights and obligations were all tied to one’s family and connections, one’s place being defined by where one sat amongst what could often become a very tangled set of relations.
One of humanity’s greatest advantages, perhaps the only one that allowed us to survive as a species and the one by which we continue to define ourselves, was our ability to innovate; to change our manner of living to suit our environment and develop tools to meet challenges not able to be overcome by mere strength and perseverance alone. Despite this need for innovation to survive we come to see that the heavy reliance on the age-old cycles of nature and what one’s tribe derived from them often made this innovation and change difficult to perform, or even conceive. More often than not even the merest hint that anything ought to be done differently was considered aberrant. When Kori and Andriki first see Muskrat swimming in a lake seemingly for pleasure (an act for which she gets her name), they at first can’t even conceive that it is a human being. They wonder what human would willingly immerse themselves in deep water and swim in it for no apparent reason? Many of Muskrat’s ways and innovations (such as snow shoes) are not truly appreciated and are even spurned and ridiculed by Kori and his tribe despite the advantages being apparent. At other times (such as when they find the remnants of a bow and arrow) an innovation cannot even be understood by them. One begins to wonder how, or if, this set of humans has the ability to look beyond their own noses until we see that even Swift, for all of his hidebound ways, is sometimes able to look beyond “what has always been” and tries to innovate, such as in his early attempts to train a wolf to help in hunting. Social mores that provide stability and order on the one hand are constantly in contention with the need to innovate and improve on the other. When two cultures with equally strong, and yet different, concepts of “how things are” meet the sad fact is that violence and death are more likely to follow than are dialogue from which both could learn and grow.
This book, and its predecessor, were equally entertaining and thought-provoking, and I only wish that there were more volumes in which I could follow the lives of the mammoth hunters and see if they are able to learn and grow from their experiences. Definitely recommended.
Society, whether based on the family, the tribe, or even the nation, is a basic element of what makes us human. It is something that provides numerous advantages as the many can often accomplish tasks that the few would find impossible, not to mention the benefits of mutual support and community that society can provide. Nonetheless this human trait of grouping ourselves together has also led to many of the basic evils inherent in our nature and perhaps the greatest of these is its creation of ‘the Other’, anyone outside of our immediate community who becomes equal parts alluring mystery and offensive demon. Mary Marshall Thomas tackles this very issue in _The Animal Wife_, the sequel to her Paleolithic historical-fantasy Reindeer Moon
As the title indicates, Thomas takes as her model the folktales of the animal wife, a woman who is really an animal masquerading as a human who becomes the lover or wife of a man. In the end the relationship ends up causing some kind of difficulty or problem, usually revolving around human social taboos, and then she disappears back into the wilderness, taking her children by the man with her. In this case the woman in question (aptly named ‘Muskrat’ by her new ‘husband’) is not actually an animal in disguise, though from the perspective of her husband and his people this might as well be the case. The main players of the tale are closely related to the characters in the previous novel, many of them making a re-appearance. This time our main character is Kori, the son of Swift (the Mammoth Hunter chieftain and shaman from the previous book) who comes to live with his father’s people and in the process stumbles upon a strange woman he sees swimming in the lake near his father’s winter hunting grounds. Driven by a compulsion even he doesn’t understand, Kori eschews all caution and abducts the woman, claiming her as a pseudo-wife. At first his tribe is unhappy with Kori’s rash action, but when no immediate reprisals from the woman’s tribe are forthcoming they come to accept that this slave is now a part of their daily lives.
Slave is not really too severe a word to use for Muskrat’s role amongst these people. While Kori does not treat her particularly harshly (at least compared to how all women seem to have been treated in this society), and even comes to feel that he loves her, she is not a true member of his tribe and thus cannot claim any of their rights. Muskrat is often left hungry even when others are well-fed since no one wishes to share with her and is always expected to do the tasks no one else wishes to do regardless of how difficult or even dangerous they may be. I don’t think there is any way to get around discussing this book without acknowledging the issue of rape. Indeed rape is clearly an underlying theme of this novel as it is a basic fact that Kori rapes Muskrat (in both the older sense of ‘stole her from her people’ as well as the more common usage regarding non-consensual sex) and ultimately fathers a child on her. Surprisingly Thomas is still able to have Kori be more than just a villain (at least I found it so) perhaps partially due to the mores of the time as expressed by Thomas, though perhaps more as a result of Muskrat’s seemingly pragmatic acceptance of her position as well as the fact that Kori himself doesn’t seem to even see that she is anything other than his wife…though this may be quibbling and I feel I am treading on dangerous ground here. Suffice it to say that Kori ends up coming across more as selfish and clueless as opposed to truly villainous or evil and Muskrat is far more than merely a victim.
Strange to say even though most of the characters act in ways that a modern reader is likely to find at least mildly reprehensible I found many of them to be sympathetic and enjoyable (though perhaps I’m just a natural misanthrope). Swift, the patriarchal chieftain of the tribe, for all of his macho bluster and self-regarding opinions, is a man of astute observations who can be as congenial as he is self-interested. Kori’s Uncle Andriki is a level-headed and jovial man usually able to head off conflict in the tribe or smooth over ruffled feathers with a few well-placed words. Kori himself, the narrator and ostensible main character of the novel, is often frustratingly naïve and selfish, though he does ultimately come across as someone with a good heart for all of his faults. Muskrat, the animal wife herself and perhaps the true centre of the tale, is fascinating. Often as much a mystery to the reader as she is to Kori and his people through her inability to communicate with them, she is soon seen to be a woman of strength and resilience who has enough room in her heart even for the man who took her from her people and the son he fathers upon her.
Thomas does an excellent job here, as she did in her previous book, with bringing her vision of a Paleolithic world to life. Her mammoth hunters are a fascinating group of people with a complex culture centred around the cycles of nature and the importance of family and familial relationships. The roles of male and female are sharply defined not only in the daily life of the people, but, in their minds at least, also in the wider world and cosmos beyond them. Of central importance to the tale are the female and male principles (spiritually and mystically personified in the figures of Ohun and the Bear) each of which has its own proper sphere of influence and to whom the shamans would plead for aid and mercy. From the supernatural world this intertwining of male and female extended to the human and each gender ‘owned’ some central aspect of the human world which came under their particular care, whether it was the lodges and hunting grounds of men, or the family lineages and mysteries of birth of women. Within the tribe, the primary component of human society in the novel, one’s rights and obligations were all tied to one’s family and connections, one’s place being defined by where one sat amongst what could often become a very tangled set of relations.
One of humanity’s greatest advantages, perhaps the only one that allowed us to survive as a species and the one by which we continue to define ourselves, was our ability to innovate; to change our manner of living to suit our environment and develop tools to meet challenges not able to be overcome by mere strength and perseverance alone. Despite this need for innovation to survive we come to see that the heavy reliance on the age-old cycles of nature and what one’s tribe derived from them often made this innovation and change difficult to perform, or even conceive. More often than not even the merest hint that anything ought to be done differently was considered aberrant. When Kori and Andriki first see Muskrat swimming in a lake seemingly for pleasure (an act for which she gets her name), they at first can’t even conceive that it is a human being. They wonder what human would willingly immerse themselves in deep water and swim in it for no apparent reason? Many of Muskrat’s ways and innovations (such as snow shoes) are not truly appreciated and are even spurned and ridiculed by Kori and his tribe despite the advantages being apparent. At other times (such as when they find the remnants of a bow and arrow) an innovation cannot even be understood by them. One begins to wonder how, or if, this set of humans has the ability to look beyond their own noses until we see that even Swift, for all of his hidebound ways, is sometimes able to look beyond “what has always been” and tries to innovate, such as in his early attempts to train a wolf to help in hunting. Social mores that provide stability and order on the one hand are constantly in contention with the need to innovate and improve on the other. When two cultures with equally strong, and yet different, concepts of “how things are” meet the sad fact is that violence and death are more likely to follow than are dialogue from which both could learn and grow.
This book, and its predecessor, were equally entertaining and thought-provoking, and I only wish that there were more volumes in which I could follow the lives of the mammoth hunters and see if they are able to learn and grow from their experiences. Definitely recommended.
December 21, 2022
Dec 20, 3pm ~~ Review asap.
Dec 21, noon-thirty ~~ Inspired by ancient folk tales, this sequel to Reindeer Moon was just as intriguing and dramatic, but gave me many more GRRR moments than RM did.
I guess those GRRRs came from the narrator here being a man. Dare I say a caveman? Yes! Kori is the son of Swift and a wife who had divorced him. We met Swift in Reindeer Moon and I liked him there. Here he serves mainly as an emcee, showing up at the beginning to introduce Kori and get the story rolling, then disappearing until close to the end while the book follows our young caveman as he faces the typical young male's issues: wanting to be as good as or better than his father, wanting a woman of his own, wanting a life of his own.
When Kori learns that he actually has a wife, he is thrilled but then appalled to see that his bride is just a child. The marriage was arranged in one of the complicated bargains that the people of the author's world had worked out in order to ensure clean bloodlines and lots of presents for relatives.
But he had dreamed of a woman, not a child that he cannot touch until many years have passed. And one day while exploring with his uncle, he finds a woman. He sees her swimming in a lake near the clan lodge, and when she comes out of the water he grabs her and runs. This was, of course, the first GRRR moment. He's a man, he sees something he wants, so he just takes it and expects the object taken to behave itself and bow to his will.
Because that is all the woman is, an object. A stranger from a completely different group of people. No common language, very few common customs. What was she doing on Kori's father's lands?! Doesn't matter, the woman is now his. She is mature enough to be touched, and she is Other enough to be told to do the most demeaning work of the clan. She is a slave, unable to protect herself, needing to accept whatever food is offered, or no food at all if no one cares to give her any. She is not from the tribe, so what does it matter if she starves? She is Other, undeserving of even the most
basic human to human respect.
Sounds familiar, doesn't it. Just imagine, this type of event probably did happen more than once back in mankind's early history. It is still happening now. Anything Other scares and offends so it must be destroyed! We are so stupid.
Anyway, I obviously never cared much for Kori. I was rooting the entire time for Muskrat, which is what Kori named the woman. She was a survivor, like the animal wives of the folk tales that inspired this book.
In the afterword, the author explains the differences between the Animal Wife type of story and the Frog Prince type. In one, the man is rescued from evil by the love of a woman. In the other there is always an unhappy ending. A person might think that hearing such tales down through the centuries we would have learned better about how to treat each other. But I guess it is easier to listen to the story itself than to the message it brings. Sigh.
Even with the GRRR moments and the disappointment with the human race that I felt after reaching the end of this book, I thought it was a good story, a fitting follow-up to Reindeer Moon and I am glad I read it.
Dec 21, noon-thirty ~~ Inspired by ancient folk tales, this sequel to Reindeer Moon was just as intriguing and dramatic, but gave me many more GRRR moments than RM did.
I guess those GRRRs came from the narrator here being a man. Dare I say a caveman? Yes! Kori is the son of Swift and a wife who had divorced him. We met Swift in Reindeer Moon and I liked him there. Here he serves mainly as an emcee, showing up at the beginning to introduce Kori and get the story rolling, then disappearing until close to the end while the book follows our young caveman as he faces the typical young male's issues: wanting to be as good as or better than his father, wanting a woman of his own, wanting a life of his own.
When Kori learns that he actually has a wife, he is thrilled but then appalled to see that his bride is just a child. The marriage was arranged in one of the complicated bargains that the people of the author's world had worked out in order to ensure clean bloodlines and lots of presents for relatives.
But he had dreamed of a woman, not a child that he cannot touch until many years have passed. And one day while exploring with his uncle, he finds a woman. He sees her swimming in a lake near the clan lodge, and when she comes out of the water he grabs her and runs. This was, of course, the first GRRR moment. He's a man, he sees something he wants, so he just takes it and expects the object taken to behave itself and bow to his will.
Because that is all the woman is, an object. A stranger from a completely different group of people. No common language, very few common customs. What was she doing on Kori's father's lands?! Doesn't matter, the woman is now his. She is mature enough to be touched, and she is Other enough to be told to do the most demeaning work of the clan. She is a slave, unable to protect herself, needing to accept whatever food is offered, or no food at all if no one cares to give her any. She is not from the tribe, so what does it matter if she starves? She is Other, undeserving of even the most
basic human to human respect.
Sounds familiar, doesn't it. Just imagine, this type of event probably did happen more than once back in mankind's early history. It is still happening now. Anything Other scares and offends so it must be destroyed! We are so stupid.
Anyway, I obviously never cared much for Kori. I was rooting the entire time for Muskrat, which is what Kori named the woman. She was a survivor, like the animal wives of the folk tales that inspired this book.
In the afterword, the author explains the differences between the Animal Wife type of story and the Frog Prince type. In one, the man is rescued from evil by the love of a woman. In the other there is always an unhappy ending. A person might think that hearing such tales down through the centuries we would have learned better about how to treat each other. But I guess it is easier to listen to the story itself than to the message it brings. Sigh.
Even with the GRRR moments and the disappointment with the human race that I felt after reaching the end of this book, I thought it was a good story, a fitting follow-up to Reindeer Moon and I am glad I read it.
January 9, 2017
The Animal Wife isn't so much a sequel to Reindeer Moon (the last book I read, reviewed here), it's a companion book. It's set in the same place and deals with the same group of people. The only difference is that it's set a couple years later and that it's told from a boy's POV instead of a girl's.
Turns out the gender of the character makes a big, big difference in how much I enjoyed the story. Set in prehistoric times (Siberia, roughly 20,000 years ago), of course women had few to no rights -- they (and their children) were owned by their husbands. That story told from a woman's point of view let us see how hard that was, how unfair and challenging a woman's life was. That story told from a male point of view was just unpleasant. The boy/young man went on endlessly about how useless women were (because they couldn't hunt, because they were concerned with "silly" and "pointless" things, because they talked and chatted too much). Yet in the first book we had learned just how not-pointless or silly those things were! So after learning how hard and unfair their lives were, in the next book we had to experience page after page of the boy looking down at them/insulting them/treating them poorly. While it was perfectly in character for the boy to think and act that way, it was not at all enjoyable to read about.
New in this book, the tribe caught a slave -- someone of a different tribe who couldn't understand their language, thus was considered to be Not A Person. This slave woman was from a people who were more advanced than the tribe, which made her conditions seem even worse. Held captive, made to do the worst work, barely given enough food, raped, and got pregnant and had her rapist's baby, etc.
While those elements were big, big things that I did not enjoy, most of the things I liked from the first book still held true for this second one. That this author was a scientist and an naturalist came shining through, as did all the research she had done. I loved the world they lived in (though it wasn't new, since we learned all about it in the first book, so my enjoyment was a little less).
I really enjoyed Elizabeth Marshall Thomas's writing style as well. While I didn't like the characters much this time, I believed them all as people. More than that, she wrote their limitations so well -- the foreign tribe, the one the slave came from, used bows. The tribe the story was set in used nothing but spears, had never seen a bow before, and their lack of understanding at how it would work was so believable. (They never saw one in use, just arrows killing someone and a broken bow.)
The Animal Wife was hard to rate on my hated-loved scale. I both disliked it a lot and enjoyed it. I settled on okay as a compromise.
---
Sometimes, once I'm done writing my own review of a book, I like to google and see the reviews others have written. This one said it up really well:
But it wasn't nearly as magical as Reindeer Moon, and at the end of the book I was left thinking: what a desolate story. ... She [slave woman] was seen as an animal because her captors in ignorance treated her as one, assumed she was stupid because she could not speak their language or understand their customs. It was really very sad. I was pleased at first to see the reappearance of the tamed-wolf theme, but it did not end well even for the poor wolf. Everyone was left with less in the end.
"Everyone was left with less in the end" sums this book up. Even the characters who got out of a bad situation (a number of them did, surprisingly) were still in a bad place -- worse than they were in at the start of the story. It was a bleak, desolate story... yet I not just finished the book, I read it fast. I enjoyed it more than I didn't enjoy it (how's that for a ringing endorsement?).
Turns out the gender of the character makes a big, big difference in how much I enjoyed the story. Set in prehistoric times (Siberia, roughly 20,000 years ago), of course women had few to no rights -- they (and their children) were owned by their husbands. That story told from a woman's point of view let us see how hard that was, how unfair and challenging a woman's life was. That story told from a male point of view was just unpleasant. The boy/young man went on endlessly about how useless women were (because they couldn't hunt, because they were concerned with "silly" and "pointless" things, because they talked and chatted too much). Yet in the first book we had learned just how not-pointless or silly those things were! So after learning how hard and unfair their lives were, in the next book we had to experience page after page of the boy looking down at them/insulting them/treating them poorly. While it was perfectly in character for the boy to think and act that way, it was not at all enjoyable to read about.
New in this book, the tribe caught a slave -- someone of a different tribe who couldn't understand their language, thus was considered to be Not A Person. This slave woman was from a people who were more advanced than the tribe, which made her conditions seem even worse. Held captive, made to do the worst work, barely given enough food, raped, and got pregnant and had her rapist's baby, etc.
While those elements were big, big things that I did not enjoy, most of the things I liked from the first book still held true for this second one. That this author was a scientist and an naturalist came shining through, as did all the research she had done. I loved the world they lived in (though it wasn't new, since we learned all about it in the first book, so my enjoyment was a little less).
I really enjoyed Elizabeth Marshall Thomas's writing style as well. While I didn't like the characters much this time, I believed them all as people. More than that, she wrote their limitations so well -- the foreign tribe, the one the slave came from, used bows. The tribe the story was set in used nothing but spears, had never seen a bow before, and their lack of understanding at how it would work was so believable. (They never saw one in use, just arrows killing someone and a broken bow.)
The Animal Wife was hard to rate on my hated-loved scale. I both disliked it a lot and enjoyed it. I settled on okay as a compromise.
---
Sometimes, once I'm done writing my own review of a book, I like to google and see the reviews others have written. This one said it up really well:
But it wasn't nearly as magical as Reindeer Moon, and at the end of the book I was left thinking: what a desolate story. ... She [slave woman] was seen as an animal because her captors in ignorance treated her as one, assumed she was stupid because she could not speak their language or understand their customs. It was really very sad. I was pleased at first to see the reappearance of the tamed-wolf theme, but it did not end well even for the poor wolf. Everyone was left with less in the end.
"Everyone was left with less in the end" sums this book up. Even the characters who got out of a bad situation (a number of them did, surprisingly) were still in a bad place -- worse than they were in at the start of the story. It was a bleak, desolate story... yet I not just finished the book, I read it fast. I enjoyed it more than I didn't enjoy it (how's that for a ringing endorsement?).
March 20, 2013
This review applies to both, Reindeer Moon and The Animal Wife by Elizabeth Marshall Thomas. First, I have to say that as much as I love Jean Auel's "Earth's Children" series, these two novels are simply the very best fictional accounts of prehistoric life on the steppe-tundra of the Altai region of Siberia during the late-Upper Paleolithic, i.e., about 20,000 years ago. The characters in Thomas's books are anatomically modern humans, i.e., Homo sapiens, and based upon the lifestyles of the characters in the two novels, these people were probably best represented by the Gravettian Culture.
By way of background, Thomas spent several years, as a young woman, studying and living with the !Kung people of the Kalahari Desert in southwestern Africa in the early-1950s. Living with, and observing, these hunter-gathers has given her unique insight in what life may well have been like in the incredibly unforgiving and harsh Ice-Age environment in Eurasia some twenty millenia ago. The !Kung people are an ancient culture and have continued to live a similar lifestyle for something probably approaching 20,000 years in the Kalahari Desert, much like that of their ancestors over the past 200,000 years since the first appearance of Homo sapiens as a species.
In both novels, Thomas has carefully researched the environmental and ecological conditions of the Ice-Age steppe-tundra ecozone, and then matched this up with her extensive knowledge and experience with the !Kung hunter-gather lifestyle. Both of these novels make for compelling reading. While these novels are at times grim and heart-wrenching, at the same time I think that both tales speak to the profoundly deep connection that these Ice-Age peoples had with their environment, and their families and clan. While the characters in both novels are complex and well-developed and the plots engaging, the core essence of both books revolves around the day-to-day need to acquire food, stay warm, and simply stay alive--none of which are particularly easy tasks. This is incredibly thought-provoking stuff that can't help but make the reader stop and reflect upon just how difficult it must have been for own ancestors as they left Africa some 80,000 years ago and began colonizing these remote and forbidding habitats around the globe, and it wasn't until the end of the Ice-Age, about 10,000 years ago, that life began to measurably improve for the human species.
Finally, if you read these books and have enjoyed them, I highly recommend Ms. Thomas's nonfiction account of her experiences with the !Kung peoples in, The Old Way: A Story of the First People (2006). It is an endlessly fascinating account of a small group of peoples who up until very recently truly lived a lifestyle that has long since passed around much of the rest of the Earth. Reading about the !Kung is quite like entering a time machine and returning to the Upper Paleolithic era of our distant ancestors.
By way of background, Thomas spent several years, as a young woman, studying and living with the !Kung people of the Kalahari Desert in southwestern Africa in the early-1950s. Living with, and observing, these hunter-gathers has given her unique insight in what life may well have been like in the incredibly unforgiving and harsh Ice-Age environment in Eurasia some twenty millenia ago. The !Kung people are an ancient culture and have continued to live a similar lifestyle for something probably approaching 20,000 years in the Kalahari Desert, much like that of their ancestors over the past 200,000 years since the first appearance of Homo sapiens as a species.
In both novels, Thomas has carefully researched the environmental and ecological conditions of the Ice-Age steppe-tundra ecozone, and then matched this up with her extensive knowledge and experience with the !Kung hunter-gather lifestyle. Both of these novels make for compelling reading. While these novels are at times grim and heart-wrenching, at the same time I think that both tales speak to the profoundly deep connection that these Ice-Age peoples had with their environment, and their families and clan. While the characters in both novels are complex and well-developed and the plots engaging, the core essence of both books revolves around the day-to-day need to acquire food, stay warm, and simply stay alive--none of which are particularly easy tasks. This is incredibly thought-provoking stuff that can't help but make the reader stop and reflect upon just how difficult it must have been for own ancestors as they left Africa some 80,000 years ago and began colonizing these remote and forbidding habitats around the globe, and it wasn't until the end of the Ice-Age, about 10,000 years ago, that life began to measurably improve for the human species.
Finally, if you read these books and have enjoyed them, I highly recommend Ms. Thomas's nonfiction account of her experiences with the !Kung peoples in, The Old Way: A Story of the First People (2006). It is an endlessly fascinating account of a small group of peoples who up until very recently truly lived a lifestyle that has long since passed around much of the rest of the Earth. Reading about the !Kung is quite like entering a time machine and returning to the Upper Paleolithic era of our distant ancestors.
November 2, 2014
Well told version of the ancient legend about the animal wife, captured against her will by an almost deliberately obtuse hunter and held until she manages to escape him and flee back to her ancestral home/original form. This version takes too long to get started: the animal wife doesn't appear until almost 40% through. Then it picks up the pace. And while historically accurate, it reveals how focused our predecessors probably were on killing and general brutality. The characters are believable but not likable. Still, I am glad, on the whole, that I finished this book.
September 20, 2015
Elizabeth Marshall Thomas writes with such authority and such power about a way of life that most of us now no longer know, or have any way of knowing, as the last of the hunter-gatherers and those peoples who still follow "The Old Ways" are almost gone.
Her experiences with people who still revere nature, without converting it into a god (or God), but allowing nature to be simply what it is. She infuses her novels with this sense of what we would term religion, but is more of an "is-ness" than religion in our sense. Even when spirits are called, they are not all-knowing or all-seeing, or even always benevolent.
Her greatest gift, though, is allowing us into the lives and minds of people who we could never hope to know, whose ways we could never truly emulate (even if we wanted to), but for all that, still possess the same hopes and dreams and jealousies as the rest of us.
She chooses an interesting narrator for The Animal Wife in Kori, because to me, the story is really about Muskrat: her deep shame, her loneliness, the feelings she must have had about Kori, both tender and not, and her eventual choice to do what she felt was right. Kori seems almost spoiled and child-like throughout the novel, and it is her skill as a writer that keeps us reading (and reading), even if we don't always (or even rarely)agree with Kori's choices.
Myth-like and almost poetic, her narrative draws us in to the life and death struggles of a people living on the margin, wintering in Siberia, and shows us how deeply questions of survival play into the social decisions of the clans and people. We can no longer imagine what it would be like to transgress against others and be starved in return, but our heart still aches for Muskrat when it happens to her.
Her experiences with people who still revere nature, without converting it into a god (or God), but allowing nature to be simply what it is. She infuses her novels with this sense of what we would term religion, but is more of an "is-ness" than religion in our sense. Even when spirits are called, they are not all-knowing or all-seeing, or even always benevolent.
Her greatest gift, though, is allowing us into the lives and minds of people who we could never hope to know, whose ways we could never truly emulate (even if we wanted to), but for all that, still possess the same hopes and dreams and jealousies as the rest of us.
She chooses an interesting narrator for The Animal Wife in Kori, because to me, the story is really about Muskrat: her deep shame, her loneliness, the feelings she must have had about Kori, both tender and not, and her eventual choice to do what she felt was right. Kori seems almost spoiled and child-like throughout the novel, and it is her skill as a writer that keeps us reading (and reading), even if we don't always (or even rarely)agree with Kori's choices.
Myth-like and almost poetic, her narrative draws us in to the life and death struggles of a people living on the margin, wintering in Siberia, and shows us how deeply questions of survival play into the social decisions of the clans and people. We can no longer imagine what it would be like to transgress against others and be starved in return, but our heart still aches for Muskrat when it happens to her.
August 26, 2018
This book is harder to review than its companion, Reindeer Moon, which I read immediately prior. It is every bit as engaging, but I found it much harder to read. The main character, Kori was, to me, a MUCH less sympathetic character than Yanan of Reindeer Moon. The grave sin he commits is not just committed in his one act of abduction, but Kori continues to transgress against the woman he claims, and claims to love with his compete lack of understanding or empathy for her or her people. His actions and beliefs cause intense suffering for Muskrat, the woman he abducts and also his own people and himself. His youthful bravado and machismo make him ugly and cruel, though he would not think himself so. These things disturbed me greatly. Kori's unintended and unrepentant brutality was hard to bear. Another reviewer was correct when they said that the story was more Muskrat's than Kori's. But we see Muskrat primarily through Kori's eyes and have to learn of her and infer her story though his blind eyes, at least through most of the book. I wish there was more emphasis on other characters that were also in Reindeer Moon, especially Teal, a strong woman and a powerful shaman. Despite my misgivings about the POV, this book was well-written, exciting, poignant and thought provoking.
August 9, 2024
5 stars--this is an excellent series if you're interested in prehistoric fiction. Marshall Thomas, as far as I can tell, only wrote three fiction books (the two in this series, and a children's Christmas book, but about the animals surrounding the nativity, not the people). It's a shame--she's an excellent writer who has a knack for describing a setting using all the senses, and who creates an utterly convincing fictional world. I wish she'd written more historical fiction.
I didn't like this book quite as much as the first, mostly because the main (and most interesting) character in this book (the animal wife herself) isn't the POV character. The POV character is her kidnapper/rapist, who never realizes what wrongs he has done her. (And why should he? His entire culture reinforces his mindset.) I really enjoyed the contrast in technology/culture between her tribe and his.
However, it's the nature descriptions--the lives of animals, the passing of the seasons--that the author evokes so well. The details of the world--the sizzling of fat on a fire, the smoke from said fire filling the lodging since there are no chimneys, the superstitions, the constant battle for survival, the instinctual fear of a tiger passing by, the squabbles and careful etiquette rules of the people--are incredible.
Marshall Thomas has the technical, detail-oriented mind of a scientist, but the imagination of an artist.
ETA: And look at her awesome author photo on Goodreads!
I didn't like this book quite as much as the first, mostly because the main (and most interesting) character in this book (the animal wife herself) isn't the POV character. The POV character is her kidnapper/rapist, who never realizes what wrongs he has done her. (And why should he? His entire culture reinforces his mindset.) I really enjoyed the contrast in technology/culture between her tribe and his.
However, it's the nature descriptions--the lives of animals, the passing of the seasons--that the author evokes so well. The details of the world--the sizzling of fat on a fire, the smoke from said fire filling the lodging since there are no chimneys, the superstitions, the constant battle for survival, the instinctual fear of a tiger passing by, the squabbles and careful etiquette rules of the people--are incredible.
Marshall Thomas has the technical, detail-oriented mind of a scientist, but the imagination of an artist.
ETA: And look at her awesome author photo on Goodreads!
July 2, 2019
Life without grocery stores. Without stoves or microwaves. Without refrigerators, preservatives, or soap. Much of the day was spent in hunting and gathering food -- in looking for animal sign, in predicting where the animals were most likely to be found, and in protecting the edible parts (most everything) from other forms of prey.
And then there's the problem of finding drinking water and having shelter, both of which are also basic needs that must be addressed if people are to survive. And these activities are accomplished in groups, fluid family groups.
On p 287, E.M. Thomas writes, "The personalities, material possessions, culture, religious life, and social life of the people in this novel are entirely fictional ..." Consequently, much of this story springs from the author's imagination and from her knowledge of isolated tribes who've had little contact with modern culture.
Thomas avoids using the word "wild" for "obvious reasons," that aren't all that obvious to me. Especially since she used 'penis, vagina, divorce, menstruation' and 'oozing vulva.' Odd word choices given the setting.
Overall, the story wasn't all that engaging, but I will read Reindeer Moon, so I can hear the events from a woman's POV.
And then there's the problem of finding drinking water and having shelter, both of which are also basic needs that must be addressed if people are to survive. And these activities are accomplished in groups, fluid family groups.
On p 287, E.M. Thomas writes, "The personalities, material possessions, culture, religious life, and social life of the people in this novel are entirely fictional ..." Consequently, much of this story springs from the author's imagination and from her knowledge of isolated tribes who've had little contact with modern culture.
Thomas avoids using the word "wild" for "obvious reasons," that aren't all that obvious to me. Especially since she used 'penis, vagina, divorce, menstruation' and 'oozing vulva.' Odd word choices given the setting.
Overall, the story wasn't all that engaging, but I will read Reindeer Moon, so I can hear the events from a woman's POV.
May 12, 2020
I really enjoyed the previous book; Reindeer moon. So I started reading this book without a doubt.The story itself was interesting and it didn't take long to finish the book; I like the narrative style of Thomas's novel. But disappointingly, at some point I figured the story was heading no where. I can see the writer was trying to point out how closed culture and lack of ability to embrace difference could bring tragical misunderstanding and stupidity. But still.. it felt as if there is a sequel waiting for me. It ended in an anticlimax and the writer could have done better with the closure of all the journey.
July 6, 2013
I so loved this book - along with Reindeer Moon - these are two of my very favorite books. I could not wait to finish - to see how it would end - as I read it so many years ago, I could not remember, but now I am so sad to have it ended. I want to keep reading. I just got her new book for my birthday - a memoir and I will be very anxious to start that. What a wonderful author!!! Loved this book.
July 17, 2018
This was terrible I could only get through half and skimmed the rest. I've read other books similar and had much more respect for them than this one and it's prequel. Characters are not interesting at all.I don't know what was in these books that earned anything above three stars??? It was so repetitive.
June 1, 2019
On my scale that rates how much I enjoyed reading a book, THE ANIMAL WIFE by Elizabeth Marshall Thomas gets five stars. Historical fiction is usually a work of fiction placed within an identifiable and perhaps familiar frame of time and place. This work, however, takes place in a pre-civiization, pre-literate, pre-history. It is the sweeping tale of a group of hunter-gatherers, men, women, and children in their own structured society who all experience the full range of human emotions and experiences as do modern humans, but is a fascinatingly different setting and culture. There are fascinating events and relationships that raise many issues for us to consider about prehistoric people: gender roles; exercise of authority; how and when to seek a mate; coping with both plenty and deprivation; tribal conflicts and cooperation; understanding and surviving, sometimes even worshiping the natural world; trust and mistrust; human relationship to animals; birth, death, family, tribe. I suspect most people are like me, ignorant of how prehistoric people lived, worked, survived, and died. Even remembering this is a work of fiction, the author makes a fascinating case for explaining these things. Five stars.
June 7, 2021
Really odd book overall, but strangely compelling. It tells the story of Kori, a young man living with a tribe of people in Siberia roughly 20,000 years ago. Which, yes, means that there are all sorts of animals around that are extinct now, especially mammoths.
The story begins with Kori leaving his mother's tribe. She left his father and brought him back to the Fire River. When a group of people from the Hair River visits, Kori meets his father for the first time and ends up leaving with him to live with his father's people.
There are parts of the book that are slow-moving, but the action picks up about midway through, when Kori spots a young woman bathing in a pond and decides, on a whim, to kidnap her and take her back to his people.
The story begins with Kori leaving his mother's tribe. She left his father and brought him back to the Fire River. When a group of people from the Hair River visits, Kori meets his father for the first time and ends up leaving with him to live with his father's people.
There are parts of the book that are slow-moving, but the action picks up about midway through, when Kori spots a young woman bathing in a pond and decides, on a whim, to kidnap her and take her back to his people.
August 14, 2020
I was really enjoying this up until the very end. There was some gratuitous violence that I did not enjoy. But more than that, Thomas did what I find so many authors do: they suddenly wrap up their story in a brief conclusion, as though they've suddenly become bored with it or are rushing to meet a deadline. There we were, ambling comfortably through 31 chapters, learning about hair styles and berries and footprints, and then there's chapter 32, in which an entire year flies by and oh so there's the large, extended family and they travel around and everyone lives happily ever after the end. Wha--??
This was an easy read, which was a nice break from the technical reading for work. Nice to get lost in. (Am I the only one who kept picturing Eric Schweig/Uncas from Last of the Mohicans as Andriki?) Although I never did figure out what a tai tibi is.
This was an easy read, which was a nice break from the technical reading for work. Nice to get lost in. (Am I the only one who kept picturing Eric Schweig/Uncas from Last of the Mohicans as Andriki?) Although I never did figure out what a tai tibi is.
June 30, 2024
This book and reindeer moon are much better than jane aul’s prehistoric novels. Very interesting to think of how humans lived for tens of thousands of years with very little change and how crazy fast things progressed in the last few thousand.
I thought this book ended rather abruptly. I would have like to have seen more of the cultural exchange between the two cultures of people and how Kori’s people came to understand the concepts of bows and arrows.
The one thing that drove me crazy was trying to figure out what the Tai tibisi animal was. I finally figured it out with the authors hint and a little research. It is the wild boar in case that was bothering anyone else.
I thought this book ended rather abruptly. I would have like to have seen more of the cultural exchange between the two cultures of people and how Kori’s people came to understand the concepts of bows and arrows.
The one thing that drove me crazy was trying to figure out what the Tai tibisi animal was. I finally figured it out with the authors hint and a little research. It is the wild boar in case that was bothering anyone else.
June 10, 2021
This was a cleaner, leaner sequel to Reindeer Moon, one that felt much more cohesive and grounded due to its focus and its lack of digressions into the spirit world. Thomas is, once again, deeply informed by her research into the behaviors of hunter-gatherers and animals, but it never takes away from her grasp of human nature. While the adventures of Kori here are an imaginative foray into how Paleolithic peoples may have hunted, had sex, and traveled, it is also a shrewd examination of human nature. The novel also serves as a grounded theory on how the animal wife archetype came to be.
February 21, 2023
If you ever get frustrated with your home, your job or really any aspect of your life, you should read this book about what life was like 20,000 years ago. I am glad I live now.
For all the physical dangers and discomforts, the book make a convincing case that all of the important struggles we face to day (marriage, parenting, gender roles, slavery, abortion, aging...) are about the same as they were back then. Our technology and wealth means we don't have to put up with fleas for the most part, but we still have to deal with homemone induced stupidity and tribalism.
For all the physical dangers and discomforts, the book make a convincing case that all of the important struggles we face to day (marriage, parenting, gender roles, slavery, abortion, aging...) are about the same as they were back then. Our technology and wealth means we don't have to put up with fleas for the most part, but we still have to deal with homemone induced stupidity and tribalism.
November 24, 2024
Early tunnel vision
This is a complex story told by a simple-minded early man, the forebear of so many generations of similar men, who simply cannot see any other way past their own hide-bound ignorance. The women are only marginally smarter and that, too has been the norm up to now when our entire world is on the brink of collapse due to multiple layers of oppression and violence. Ms Thomas seems to have done her prehistoric homework, or faked it with believability. Kudos to her for that.
This is a complex story told by a simple-minded early man, the forebear of so many generations of similar men, who simply cannot see any other way past their own hide-bound ignorance. The women are only marginally smarter and that, too has been the norm up to now when our entire world is on the brink of collapse due to multiple layers of oppression and violence. Ms Thomas seems to have done her prehistoric homework, or faked it with believability. Kudos to her for that.
May 28, 2019
Just okay...
I like reading novels set in this prehistoric time period, and this one seemed well researched, but it did not measure up to books in “ The Clan of the Cave Bear” series. I was not particularly fond of the narrator, and some of the other characters seemed wooden.
I like reading novels set in this prehistoric time period, and this one seemed well researched, but it did not measure up to books in “ The Clan of the Cave Bear” series. I was not particularly fond of the narrator, and some of the other characters seemed wooden.
February 23, 2022
Interesting
I enjoy stories about people who were in early times. This is not the same as Clan of the Cave Bear which was also enjoyable. Try this one, let your imagination run free!
I enjoy stories about people who were in early times. This is not the same as Clan of the Cave Bear which was also enjoyable. Try this one, let your imagination run free!
August 11, 2018
I enjoyed it, definitely for the Clan of the Cave Bear crowd from the 90's. Hard to find. Get both Reindeer Moon and Animal Wife from Amazon together and read them in order so its easier to follow
November 15, 2018
Very good story. Thoroughly enjoyed it.
December 27, 2018
I get that you have to be realistic of the time and culture.. But Seriously!!! Sigh...
July 23, 2020
I think I enjoyed the first one a little bit more, but I was still drawn into the adventure, the story of it all.
July 31, 2021
A very good read
I loved reading about the ancient’s way of life and the bias and prejudice that existed even then ( In the writer’s mind)
I loved reading about the ancient’s way of life and the bias and prejudice that existed even then ( In the writer’s mind)
December 13, 2024
The scene where they were camped out inside the partially decomposed mammoth carcass and a group of cave lions is roaming around outside it, epic.
March 29, 2025
Men, am I right or am I right?
November 24, 2014
I can't help comparing this book with "Reindeer Moon" which is Ms. Marshall's first book about the same territory at the same time where often the same people cross over into each book. I have to say, first, that Ms. M remains a genius at her ability to describe the world her characters live in. I also liked that this book is balanced against "Reindeer Moon" in the sense that it is told by a young man (Kori).
His views of male life seem in many ways to be true. That is, the sense of camaraderie and general good will in small groups. This is not to say that men absolutely are never mean to each other, but that there is a live-and-let-live quality to at least their casual association. In the book, this is witnessed when the men simply get together, and Kori reflects on it. Their is also an acceptance of leadership counterbalanced by individualism that is often criticized, but generally respected. The book shows this in the group's passive permission to Kori to go searching for his missing "wife" among people who are beyond the group's horizon and therefore unknown.
I also very much liked the use of the animal-wife trope in world folk literature (including western folk literature) as a theme for the unlikely and loose bond between Kori and the woman he abducts. His and the group's inability to understand her or her language or her attitudes bring to mind our modern inability to see the other as human. The parallel with the trope is closest when Kori breaks the fetish meant to assure the prosperous future of his and his wife's son. This is the act that drives the animal wife away - as when, in the stories that are the book's epigraphs, a man complains about the odor of the fox-wife or beats the wife one time too many. The book points out, in a sense, the contingent nature of a relationship when there is no actual meeting of the minds, but at least one party to it believes there is a contract.
What is interesting is that Yannan in Reindeer Moon has a close connection with the animals of her environment. Kori, however, does not seem to have such an intimate connection. His primary connection with the animal world is through Bear who seems to be the men's divinity (as opposed to the women's), hunting, and the experience with his animal-wife whom he subjects as Yannan never subjects an animal to her.
We may be horrified by how Kori abducts his wife. But Ms. M has very little to say about it. It simply happens. It is a fact of the book, and therefore she makes it a fact of life of the people in the book. Indeed, the wife accepts her situation. Or, if she does not accept it, she simply lives it or resigns herself to it.
I enjoyed this book. But, on the whole, I liked the voice of Yannan in Reindeer Moon better. With all her errors of judgment and emotional turmoil, she was able to express better her own inner world than Kori does. Nonetheless, Ms. M is, as I said, a genius. I have checked her bibliography briefly will read her book on hunter-gatherer groups.
His views of male life seem in many ways to be true. That is, the sense of camaraderie and general good will in small groups. This is not to say that men absolutely are never mean to each other, but that there is a live-and-let-live quality to at least their casual association. In the book, this is witnessed when the men simply get together, and Kori reflects on it. Their is also an acceptance of leadership counterbalanced by individualism that is often criticized, but generally respected. The book shows this in the group's passive permission to Kori to go searching for his missing "wife" among people who are beyond the group's horizon and therefore unknown.
I also very much liked the use of the animal-wife trope in world folk literature (including western folk literature) as a theme for the unlikely and loose bond between Kori and the woman he abducts. His and the group's inability to understand her or her language or her attitudes bring to mind our modern inability to see the other as human. The parallel with the trope is closest when Kori breaks the fetish meant to assure the prosperous future of his and his wife's son. This is the act that drives the animal wife away - as when, in the stories that are the book's epigraphs, a man complains about the odor of the fox-wife or beats the wife one time too many. The book points out, in a sense, the contingent nature of a relationship when there is no actual meeting of the minds, but at least one party to it believes there is a contract.
What is interesting is that Yannan in Reindeer Moon has a close connection with the animals of her environment. Kori, however, does not seem to have such an intimate connection. His primary connection with the animal world is through Bear who seems to be the men's divinity (as opposed to the women's), hunting, and the experience with his animal-wife whom he subjects as Yannan never subjects an animal to her.
We may be horrified by how Kori abducts his wife. But Ms. M has very little to say about it. It simply happens. It is a fact of the book, and therefore she makes it a fact of life of the people in the book. Indeed, the wife accepts her situation. Or, if she does not accept it, she simply lives it or resigns herself to it.
I enjoyed this book. But, on the whole, I liked the voice of Yannan in Reindeer Moon better. With all her errors of judgment and emotional turmoil, she was able to express better her own inner world than Kori does. Nonetheless, Ms. M is, as I said, a genius. I have checked her bibliography briefly will read her book on hunter-gatherer groups.
November 14, 2012
Magnificent! Both The Reindeer Moon and The Animal Wife sweep the reader away into a far away time, when we were just another animal species. One can almost smell the flora and fauna these ancient people are part of.
This volume imagines the world of migratory hunter-gatherers from Kori's point of view. It is the story of Kori, a young male, and his coming of age. Harsh lessons come to him in the end as his theft of a young woman from an alien people plays itself out. Revenge. Loss. Tragedy. Yet tribal life sputters on into the future.
The author uses an organizing principle in the telling of both tales that I very much enjoyed. She followed the seasonal cycle through the naming of the moons. Yanan's people, who showed a marked preference for fish and so lived nearer rivers, named the moons differently from Kori's people, who hunted the great mammoth on the plains. She also gets high marks from me for her maps, her genealogy chart and her list of characters in each novel. Bot are a must read!
This volume imagines the world of migratory hunter-gatherers from Kori's point of view. It is the story of Kori, a young male, and his coming of age. Harsh lessons come to him in the end as his theft of a young woman from an alien people plays itself out. Revenge. Loss. Tragedy. Yet tribal life sputters on into the future.
The author uses an organizing principle in the telling of both tales that I very much enjoyed. She followed the seasonal cycle through the naming of the moons. Yanan's people, who showed a marked preference for fish and so lived nearer rivers, named the moons differently from Kori's people, who hunted the great mammoth on the plains. She also gets high marks from me for her maps, her genealogy chart and her list of characters in each novel. Bot are a must read!
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