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This is actually a book I read a lot in my childhood, then discarded my copy of (the Dutch edition), and then started to really regret that action. So when I got the chance to get a copy in English, I of course jumped right on it, seeing how that is my preferred reading language, anyways. Let's have a look at Wolf Brother. Spoilers ahead.
After the death of his father, a young boy named Torak is left to his own devices, with his father's killer, a demonic bear, still on the loose. Torak, having sworn to his father to make a grand journey and defeat the bear, sets out on set trip. On the way, he comes across a lost wolf cub, which he takes in, and later befriends a tough hunter girl named Renn from the Raven Tribe. Together, they'll have to work towards defeating the bear before it's too late and the possessed creature becomes all-powerful.
It's a pretty simple story, but, despite that, very successful in what it does. We have a simple villain, but it works. Sometimes a nigh-unstoppable force of nature of the unknown is enough to make us shiver with fear. The bear is very effective, moving often without noise and showing up in the most unexpected of places. We also instantly know what kind of damage it can do because we start out with Torak's father's death.
There's some antagonists, such as the Raven Tribe and Hord, but the focus is where it should be: defeating the bear by finding the supernatural components of the Nanuak, and the journey on how we get there.
The writing was very digestible and I really applaud Paver for her neat writing style. I didn't have any issue getting into it, even back when I was reading it in Dutch. The characters are also well-rounded, even Wolf, who doesn't talk. I also really liked how Paver wrote from Wolf's point of view. He has his own names for the things in the world around him, which makes total sense since he isn't human and isn't anthropomorphic.
I really like the world Paver created, too. Taking place in the Stone Age with quite a few fantastical elements surrounding it, the world feels simply real. The animals and supernatural things we come across, the people and Tribes we meet, it all feels rounded and well thought out, despite this book clearly leaving a lot of room open for future books to further explore the world. Honestly, re-reading this book kind of made me feel like a kid that wanted to travel to this universe again.
I guess I could say that I have one extremely minor nitpick in that I find Wolf's name to be very uncreative. He's a wolf, so let's call him Wolf. I don't know, with humans that all have distinct names that are unique and full of imagination, somehow calling a one of your main characters simply after their species feels a bit unimaginative. Again, a very minor nitpick, though, that doesn't influence my liking of the book whatsoever.
Overall, I can safely say I am looking forward to reading book Two, should I ever get to it again.
Rating: 5/5
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