The Red Snow
A Story of The Alaska Gray Wolf, by the author of ''Wager With the Wind.''
by James Greiner
- 3 Want to read
The Red Snow is a book rich in Arctic lore, which only a man who has spent much of his life in the inaccessible wilderness reaches of Alaska could have treated with such authority. Inside-back dust jkt.
July 05,2018 Goodreads member: Argyl rating: It was ok - 2 of 5 stars
I'm an avid reader of natural history in general, and books about particular animal species in particular, so I was quite eager to read The Red Snow, which follows the life of a pack of Arctic wolves for a year. Greiner is obviously knowledgeable about the subject and the book is full of interesting detail concerning the lives of wolves and other fauna and flora of the Arctic. Ostensibly, The Red Snow is fiction but the artifice of writing fiction is not much in evidence here, and the book wallows in page after page of description and explication.Greiner's writing style is repetitive, with little variation in sentence structure or length (most sentences are unnecessarily long). The only significant conflict in the book--that between the wolf pack and a crusty old trapper seeking revenge for the death of his dog and other crimes--is introduced too late in the book to be considered plot. There are many books about wolves that are fascinating and well-written. I would stick with those.
Check nearby libraries
Buy this book
Previews available in: English
Subjects
Non-Fiction, Literature, Hardcover, Anecdotes, Arctic, Lore, People, Wild, Animals, Dens, Carcass, Wolverine, Wolves, Black, Gray, Wolf, Caribou, Calf, Nature, Science, Wilds, WildernessPeople
Eskimo, Margaret Murie, Ida Greiner, Gaylen Searles, Sally Aarteseros, Dr. Victor Vanballenberghe, David Mech, Dr. R. Dale Guthrie, Mr. Robert [Bob] Stephenson, Gov. Jay Mammond, Jim Smith, Jim Dixon, Pete Haggland, Henry Nashookpuk.Places
Fairbanks, Homer, Port Hope, Alaska, Anatuvuk, Porcupine River, Tatlanik, Tatlanika Valley, Tatlanika River, Three-Mile Creek, Alaska Mountain Range, Aleutian Range, Aleutian Chain, Brooks Range, Toklat River, Mount McKinley National Park, Yukon, St. George Creek, MacCombe Plateau, Tanana Hills, Minnesota, Moose, WyomingTimes
1970s| Edition | Availability |
|---|---|
1
Red Snow: A Story of the Alaskan Gray Wolf
2016, St. Martin's Press
in English
1250112931 9781250112934
|
zzzz
|
2
The Red Snow: A Story of the Alaskan Gray Wolf
January 1, 1985, St. Martin's Press
Hardcover
in English
0312667183 9780312667184
|
zzzz
|
3
The Red Snow: A Story of The Alaska Gray Wolf, by the author of ''Wager With the Wind.''
1980, Doubleday Company, Inc.
Hardcover
in English
- Doubleday First Edition
0385131690 9780385131698
|
aaaa
|
|
4
|
zzzz
|
5
|
eeee
|
Book Details
Edition Notes
Classifications
The Physical Object
Edition Identifiers
Work Identifiers
Work Description
In The Red Snow, his second work, Greiner turns his keen eye to Alaska's vast wilderness and its most mysterious creature: the gray wolf. Basing his story on careful research and personal observation, Greiner recounts the lives of the Tanana River Valley wolf pack and the tough, lonely hunter, Jake, who inhabits their valley. In splendid detail, he describes the birth of pups, the victory of the hunt, and the habits of animals who share the wolves' valley. Yet in describing the beauty, he never forgets the harshness of the Arctic wilderness; Greiner makes the ugly realities of the fight for survival intensely clear.
Feb 09, 2018 Goodreads member: Cienna Lyon liked it 3 of 5 stars.
This book shows its age, but that doesn't mean it's bad. The book was written in the 1980's, but I assume it is set in an earlier time due to certain aspects of the story. The natural aspect of this is absolutely amazing. The entire book has no dialogue, and is simply a day by day descriptions of a wolf pack's life as well as the animals that interact with them.
If you don't enjoy animal behavior or detailed descriptions of nature it probably isn't for you, as the prose can be lengthy and sometimes over detailed or boring. The only aspect I genuinely didn't like was the human interaction with the wolf. I think we're meant to care about Tatum, a trapper living in Alaskan wilderness and this is where the age of the book really shows.
SPOILERS: The trapper seeks revenge against the wolf pack because he hates wolves, they chewed up his snowmobile seat and very late in the book one of the wolves kills his dog (something they would very rarely do in reality). So in retaliation he traps 3 of them in snares and foot traps, which is horrid and many other animals fall prey to this and later he decimates all but two of the wolves by airplane. Honestly this was so hard to read and I don't understand why a good book was ruined by this addition. My only complaint, but it makes me like the book a lot less.
Community Reviews (0)
Lists
See All-
libros
from ramond
-
maybe borrow
from kathleen jennings
-
To read
from Matt Hayes
History
- Created March 30, 2020
- 5 revisions
Wikipedia citation
×CloseCopy and paste this code into your Wikipedia page. Need help?
| October 13, 2020 | Edited by MARC Bot | import existing book |
| March 30, 2020 | Edited by ED Power | id, dimen |
| March 30, 2020 | Edited by ED Power | Alt ed. ent. |
| March 30, 2020 | Edited by ED Power | Added new cover |
| March 30, 2020 | Created by ED Power | Added new book. |