The Tiger

The Tiger / John Valiant



Set in Russia's Maritime Territory, Vaillant's story concerns a tiger of the endangered Amur subspecies that killed three hunters in 1997. Expanding from the incidents' central facts, Vaillant's narrative explores humans' relationship with predatory animals in general, with the Amur tiger as the specific example. Literary, folkloric, and scientific sources combine into a deeply sensitive depiction of the tiger's adaptation to its forested, mountainous, and wintry environment. As he recounts how Russians such as the hunters in question also attempt to extract a living from the taiga, possibly including illegal poaching of the tiger, Vaillant posits the tiger's thoughts about the competition, inferring its intelligence from a conservation warden's investigation into the cases of the unfortunate hunters, who were felled in ambush-style attacks. Interest in Vaillant's work, which climaxes in the warden's pursuit of the deadly tiger, will partake of humans' instinctual fear of large carnivores, the modern imperative to preserve them from extinction, and readers of Vaillant's The Golden Spruce (2005), a positively reviewed, deep-drilling work, also about the nexus between humans and the natural world.--Taylor, Gilbert Copyright 2010 Booklist

Library Journal Review
In the winter of 1997, a huge tiger is stalking-and devouring-hunters on the edge of an isolated Siberian village. Yuri Trush and his team of tiger inspectors are called to the scene to investigate one incident, and ultimately, to determine the tiger's fate. Nature writer Vaillant (The Golden Spruce) follows Trush's team as they track the tiger on foot through dense forest in the bitter cold while documenting the effects of the tiger crisis on the desperately troubled village. What spirits this adventure narrative from compelling to brilliant is Vaillant's use of the tiger hunt as an allegorical lens through which to understand the cultural, economic, and environmental devastation of post-Communist Russia. Vaillant suggests that the lone tiger's desperate acts are merely symptomatic of the larger crisis facing wild tiger populations-and their human counterparts-in contemporary Russia. VERDICT This energetic hybrid of classic adventure and impassioned sociocultural critique will appeal to Jon Krakauer fans, tiger lovers, and readers interested in contemporary Russian history. It might also attract fans of the film The Ghost and the Darkness, based on J.H. Patterson's The Man-Eaters of Tsavo.
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