Lillian H. Smith Blog

When this book came in to the library, I'd completely forgotten about placing a hold on it months ago.  And at first glance, I couldn't remember why I'd ordered it!  The story of a man-eating tiger in the wilds of far-Eastern Russia?  A place I had only a vague awareness of being somewhere south of Kamchatka on a Risk board, and populated by rough tayozhniks (forest dwellers), mostly men, wielding rifles and hunting or poaching wildlife to survive?

Well, it turns out this book is amazing. Vaillant tracks the events of December, 1997, when Vladimir Markov was hunted and killed by an enormous Amur tiger, but he packs a lot of depth and analysis into the narrative.  Everything from Communism and post-Perestroika Russia to human evolution and our relationship to animal predators throughout history is examined.  He also covers literary and scientific references to tigers going back to Shakespeare's time and earlier.

My only criticism is that the book could have benefited from an index.  I found myself flipping back frequently to check on names and some of the Russian terms.  That said, there is a helpful bibliography.  I'd like to read some of Elizabeth Marshall Thomas's books.

As summer begins here, is it worth reading about walking through the cold, snow-covered taiga, wondering with a shiver if a tiger's on your trail?  You bet!  The Tiger has also been nominated for a 2011 Evergreen award.