In the year 30,000 BC, several tribes of prehistoric humans struggle to survive the dawning Ice Age. Surrounded on all sides by deadly threats, how did these prehistoric humans manage to muddle through to the modern day? The answer might have fur and fangs.
It's lucky that I decided to read this book when I did. Even though I've always had a fascination with prehistoric and early historic cultures, recently I've been watching every single Youtube video I can find on the subject. With this in mind, I can tell that Cameron did his research. Yes, in the grand scheme of things, we know very little about our ancient ancestors. But you can tell Cameron put no small amount of effort into what is a truly ambitious story. In fact, this isn't just one book. It's broken into two, both roughly 200 pages long. If you can get through the first, you'll be sure to enjoy the second.
~~~SPOILERS~~~
The first book is largely a worldbuilding book. It introduces us to several different groups of prehistoric people - The Kindred, the Wolfen, The Cohort, The Blanc, The River Clan, and the Frightened Ones. While they're never specifically named in the book, the Frightened Ones are Neanderthals and are woefully underutilized. The Kindred bear the strongest resemblance to modern humans are are WOEFULLY over utilized.
"But wait!" you may wonder. "I thought this was a book about the first dog?"
Yes. It is. Sort of.
To that end, our VERY large cast of humans is joined by a pack of wolves. Not a domesticated pack, but a feral one. We see through the eyes of several Alpha Females throughout the course of the story, but I personally think this could have been pushed a little harder. There were several points where I was muddling through a Kindred-Love-Decagon that the only reason I kept reading was due to a wolf POV cut.
For some reason it also cuts forwards and backwards between the past and the present, which I found a little annoying, but might have been good in the grand scheme of things, as it probably would have lost my interest otherwise.
The main focus is on the Kindred and the Wolfen. The Wolfen bits are a little stronger than the Kindred bits. I found myself caring much more about what happened to our main Wolfen character (Silex) than our main Kindred character (Calli... I guess?). The perk of this very large cast is that if you aren't interested in what's going on in one story, another story will be along in a couple paragraphs or pages. The short scenes and quick cuts between perspectives make it easy to fly right through, but you (like me) might find yourself resenting certain characters for bogging down the pace with yet another love triangle.
Also, I think about a quarter of the sex scenes could have been cut. Nothing against them, but at some point enough is enough. The problem is compounded by the fact that they are... decidedly not very sexy sex scenes containing very little chemistry. Trigger warning for readers, this book also includes a couple instances of rape, one of which I couldn't understand as serving any purpose whatsoever. The instance occurs, the woman in the scenario seems to experience no lasting effects, the man never receives any sort of comeuppance for doing it, and (in fact) has a sort of happy ending by the end of the book. It could have been cut and it wouldn't have effected the story at all.
The first book sets the stage for the second, which is more similar to a coming-of-age story. At the end of the first book, a Kindred named Calli gives birth to a child with a deformed leg, who the Council Mother (Albi) insists is a curse upon the tribe. We follow this character (Mal) as he struggles with the fear and ridicule that goes hand-in-hand with his disability. Following a series of horrific events that has nothing to do with Mal's leg and everything to do with the coming Ice Age, Mal is banished from the tribe and forced to survive in the wild by himself. This is more of a man-vs-nature story than the first book and it's also much stronger overall, with more sympathetic/relatable characters. Plus hey, the Dog is finally here.
I gave this book 3 stars, but this was mainly due to balance issues between Book One and Book Two. Book Two (in and of itself) probably deserves something more like 4 stars. But Book One might only be scraping by with a 2.5. All-in-all this is a mixed bag of a story, elevated by Cameron's straight-forward writing style and strong grasp of source material, as well as some pretty decent (if simplistic) world-building.
I would recommend this book to people who enjoy prehistoric stories, dog stories, or to others who are fans of W. Bruce Cameron.
EM Jeanmougin
writes Queer Urban Fantasy, Flash Horror, & Poetry.
Find Out More @ www.hunterandspider.com
