The Tiger: A True Story of Vengeance and Survival by John Vaillant (English) Pap

Description: The Tiger by John Vaillant In December 1997, a man-eating tiger is on the prowl outside a remote village in Russias Far East. As the trackers sift through the gruesome remains of the victims, they discover that these attacks arent random: the tiger is apparently engaged in a vendetta. FORMAT Paperback LANGUAGE English CONDITION Brand New Publisher Description NATIONAL BESTSELLER • A gripping story of man pitted against natures most fearsome and efficient predator. This "travelogue about tiger poaching in Russias far east opens up a new genre ... [the] conservation thriller" (Nature).Outside a remote village in Russias Far East a man-eating tiger is on the prowl. The tiger isnt just killing people, its murdering them, almost as if it has a vendetta. A team of trackers is dispatched to hunt down the tiger before it strikes again. They know the creature is cunning, injured, and starving, making it even more dangerous. As John Vaillant re-creates these extraordinary events, he gives us an unforgettable and masterful work of narrative nonfiction that combines a riveting portrait of a stark and mysterious region of the world and its people, with the natural history of natures most deadly predator. Author Biography JOHN VAILLANTs acclaimed, award-winning non-fiction books, The Golden Spruce and The Tiger, were #1 national bestsellers. His debut novel, The Jaguars Children, was a finalist for the Rogers Writers Trust Fiction Prize and the International Dublin Literary Award. He has written for, among others, The New Yorker, The Atlantic, National Geographic, and The Walrus. He lives in Vancouver. Review "Magnificent.... Suspenseful.... The Tiger offers readers a shiver-inducing portrait of a predator."—San Francisco Chronicle"Mesmerizing ... a blistering good tale, stocked with fascinating characters, none more compelling than the tiger itself ... the adventure book of the year."—Cleveland Plain Dealer"A masterpiece.... What elevates The Tiger from adventure yarn to nonfiction classic is Vaillants mastery of language." —Outside "A riveting story." —The Washington Post"Brilliant ... A tale of astonishing power and vigor ... Read this fine, true book in the warmth, beside the flicker of the firelight. Read it and be afraid. Be very afraid." —Simon Winchester, The Globe and Mail (Toronto) "[A] riveting story ... Vaillants book teaches a lesson that humankind desperately needs to remember: When you murder a tiger, you not only kill a strong and beautiful beast, you extinguish a passionate soul."—Washington Post "[An] epic story.... A travelogue about tiger poaching in Russias far east opens up a new genre ... [the] conservation thriller."—Nature "If ever a nonfiction author has used the techniques of fiction any better to recount a real-life narrative, it is difficult to imagine who that author would be.... Think of Vaillant as a younger version of John McPhee, but on steroids." —The Seattle Times "Riveting, often chilling.... A remarkable, thoroughly researched, informative chronicle that will appeal to readers interested in the conservation of wildlife."—Providence Journal "Nonfiction as riveting as any detective story.... Vaillant sets the stage for an epic encounter that unfolds dramatically and inexorably, climaxing in a stunning encounter."—Christian Science Monitor "An extraordinary book, bringing vividly to life this rare and terrifying creature and the men who are setting their lives at stake every day in a barely civilized part of the world. This is a real-life adventure story that is rarely encountered."—The Washington Times "A remarkable and thoughtful account of a distant place where man and animal meet with fatal consequences."—Richmond Times Dispatch "Told with passion and deep knowledge of the history cultures, folk tales, flora and fuana of this part of the world ... The Tiger has the pace and precision of a spy thriller."—Waterbury Republican-American Review Quote "Magnificent. . . . Suspenseful. . . . The Tiger offers readers a shiver-inducing portrait of a predator."-- San Francisco Chronicle "Mesmerizing . . . a blistering good tale, stocked with fascinating characters, none more compelling than the tiger itself . . . the adventure book of the year."-- Cleveland Plain Dealer "A masterpiece. . . . What elevates The Tiger from adventure yarn to nonfiction classic is Vaillants mastery of language." -- Outside Description for Reading Group Guide The introduction, discussion questions, and suggested further reading that follow are designed to enhance your groups discussion of John Vaillants arresting account of the hunt for a man-eating tiger in Russias most diverse forest. Discussion Question for Reading Group Guide 1. The Tiger is a riveting book, with the momentum of a thriller and the depth of insight of an extended philosophical meditation. How does Vaillant create suspense throughout the book? What are the major insights he offers about tigers and the larger issues that come into focus through his investigation of the killing of Vladimir Markov? 2. What historical forces have contributed to the desperate conditions facing the people of the Primorye? How understandable/forgivable is their poaching? 3. Vaillant writes: "What is amazing--and also terrifying about tigers--is their facility for what can only be described as abstract thinking. Very quickly, a tiger can assimilate new information . . . ascribe it to a source, and even a motive, and react accordingly" [p. 136]. In what ways does the tiger that kills Markov engage in abstract thinking? 4. Does Markov deserve the fate that befalls him? Is it fair to say that he brought on his own death by stealing the tigers kill or by shooting at the tiger? 5. What kind of man is Yuri Trush? In what ways is he both fierce and thoughtful, authoritarian and at the same time sensitive to the desperation that makes people of the Primorye break the law? How does his experience with the tiger change him? 6. Vaillant attributes the attitude of entitlement of Russian homesteaders, at least in part, to biblical injunctions: "1: Be fruitful and multiply, and replenish the earth. 2: And the fear of you and the dread of you shall be upon every beast of the earth . . . . 3: Every moving thing that liveth shall be meat for you; even as the green herb have I given you all things" [p. 150]. What are the consequences of this way of viewing our relationship to the earth and other animals? 7. Chapter 18 begins with a epigraph from Moby-Dick. What are the parallels between Trushs hunt for the tiger and Ahabs pursuit of the whale and between the behavior of the tiger and that the whale in these stories? 8. After he helps to kill the tiger, native people tell Trush hes now marked by it, that he now bears, as Vaillant puts it, "some ineffable taint, discernible only to tigers" [p. 290]. When an otherwise tame and placid tiger tries to attack him at a wildlife rehabilitation center, Trush wonders if "some sort of a bio field exists . . . . Maybe tigers can feel some connection through the cosmos, or have some common language. I dont know. I cant explain it" [p. 291]. Is this merely a fanciful conjecture, or could it be true that tigers can sense the presence of someone who has killed one of their kind? If true, how would it change our views of animal consciousness? 9. Vaillant suggests that, like captive tigers, most of us "live how and where we do because, at some point in the recent past, we were forced out of our former habitats and ways of living by more aggressive, if not better adapted, humans. Worth asking here is: Where does this trend ultimately lead? Is there a better way to honor the fact that we survived?" [p. 298]. How might these questions be answered? 10. Vaillant argues that "by mass-producing food, energy, material goods, and ourselves, we have attempted to secede from, and override, the natural order" [p. 304]. What are the consequences of this desire to separate ourselves from nature? 11. What makes tigers both so frightening and so fascinating? What mythic value do they have for humans? In what ways are they an important part of the ecosystem? 12. What does the book as a whole suggest about our relationship to nature, particularly to the animals that share the earth with us? 13. It is a precarious time, not just for the Amur tiger, but for all tigers. Poaching and the destruction of tiger habitat pose major challenges to the survival of the species. What would be the significance of the loss of the tiger? What positive steps have been taken to protect it? 14. What changes in human behavior need to happen in order to preserve the (Amur) tiger and similar species? How likely is it that humans will make such changes? (For a complete list of available reading group guides, and to sign up for the Reading Group Center enewsletter, visit: ) Excerpt from Book Prologue HANGING IN THE TREES , AS IF CAUGHT THERE, IS A SICKLE OF A MOON. Its wan light scatters shadows on the snow below, only obscuring further the forest that this man negotiates now as much by feel as by sight. He is on foot and on his own save for a single dog, which runs ahead, eager to be heading home at last. All around, the black trunks of oak, pine, and poplar soar into the dark above the scrub and deadfall, and their branches form a tattered canopy overhead. Slender birches, whiter than the snow, seem to emit a light of their own, but it is like the coat of an animal in winter: cold to the touch and for itself alone. All is quiet in this dormant, frozen world. It is so cold that spit will freeze before it lands; so cold that a tree, brittle as straw and unable to contain its expanding sap, may spontaneously explode. As they progress, man and dog alike leave behind a wake of heat, and the contrails of their breath hang in pale clouds above their tracks. Their scent stays close in the windless dark, but their footfalls carry and so, with every step, they announce themselves to the night. Despite the bitter cold, the man wears rubber boots better suited to the rain; his clothes, too, are surprisingly light, considering that he has been out all day, searching. His gun has grown heavy on his shoulder, as have his rucksack and cartridge belt. But he knows this route like the back of his hand, and he is almost within sight of his cabin. Now, at last, he can allow himself the possibility of relief. Perhaps he imagines the lantern he will light and the fire he will build; perhaps he imagines the burdens he will soon lay down. The water in the kettle is certainly frozen, but the stove is thinly walled and soon it will glow fiercely against the cold and dark, just as his own body is doing now. Soon enough, there will be hot tea and a cigarette, followed by rice, meat, and more cigarettes. Maybe a shot or two of vodka, if there is any left. He savors this ritual and knows it by rote. Then, as the familiar angles take shape across the clearing, the dog collides with a scent as with a wall and stops short, growling. They are hunting partners and the man understands: someone is there by the cabin. The hackles on the dogs back and on his own neck rise together. Together, they hear a rumble in the dark that seems to come from everywhere at once. PART ONE MARKOV 1 There are many people who dont believe this actually happened. They think its some phantasm of my imagination. But it was real. There are the facts. Yuri Anatolievich Trush Shortly after dark on the afternoon of December 5, 1997, an urgent message was relayed to a man named Yuri Trush at his home in Luchegorsk, a mid-sized mining town in Primorye Territory in Russias Far East, not far from the Chinese border. Primorye (Pri- mor -ya) is, among other things, the last stronghold of the Siberian tiger, and the official on the line had some disturbing news: a man had been attacked near Sobolonye, a small logging community located in the deep forest, sixty miles northeast of Luchegorsk. Yuri Trush was the squad leader of an Inspection Tiger unit, one of six in the territory whose purpose was to investigate forest crimes, specifically those involving tigers. Because poachers were often involved, these included tiger attacks. As a result, this situation-whatever it might entail-was now Trushs problem and, right away, he began preparing for the trip to Sobolonye. _____ Early the following morning-Saturday-Yuri Trush, along with his squadmates Alexander Gorborukov and Sasha Lazurenko, piled into a surplus army truck and rumbled north. Dressed in insulated fatigues and camouflage, and armed with knives, pistols, and semiautomatic rifles, the Tigers, as these inspectors are sometimes called, looked less like game wardens than like some kind of wilderness SWAT team. Their twenty-year-old truck was nicknamed a Kung, and it was the Russian armys four-ton equivalent to the Unimog and the Humvee. Gasoline-powered, with a winch, four-wheel-drive, and wide waist-high tires, it is a popular vehicle in Primoryes hinterlands. Along with a gun rack and brackets for extra fuel cans, this one had been modified to accommodate makeshift bunks, and was stocked with enough food to last four men a week. It was also equipped with a woodstove so that, even in the face of total mechanical failure, the crew could survive no matter where in the wilderness they happened to be. After passing through the police checkpoint on the edge of town, the Tigers continued on up to a dirt road turnoff that led eastward along the Bikin River (be- keen ), a large and meandering waterway that flows through some of the most isolated country in northern Primorye. The temperature was well below freezing and the snow was deep, and this slowed the heavy trucks progress. It also allowed these men, all of whom were experienced hunters and former soldiers, many hours to ponder and discuss what might be awaiting them. It is safe to say that nothing in their experience could have prepared them for what they found there. Primorye, which is also known as the Maritime Territory, is about the size of Washington state. Tucked into the southeast corner of Russia by the Sea of Japan, it is a thickly forested and mountainous region that combines the backwoods claustrophobia of Appalachia with the frontier roughness of the Yukon. Industry here is of the crudest kind: logging, mining, fishing, and hunting, all of which are complicated by poor wages, corrupt officials, thriving black markets-and some of the worlds largest cats. _____ One of the many negative effects of perestroika and the reopening of the border between Russia and China has been a surge in tiger poaching. As the economy disintegrated and unemployment spread throughout the 1990s, professional poachers, businessmen, and ordinary citizens alike began taking advantage of the forests wealth in all its forms. The tigers, because they are so rare and so valuable, have been particularly hard hit: their organs, blood, and bone are much sought after for use in traditional Chinese medicine. Some believe the tigers whiskers will make them bulletproof and that its powdered bones will soothe their aches and pains. Others believe its penis will make them virile, and there are many-from Tokyo to Moscow-who will pay thousands of dollars for a tigers skin. Between 1992 and 1994, approximately one hundred tigers-roughly one quarter of the countrys wild population-were killed. Most of them ended up in China. With financial assistance (and pressure) from international conservation agencies, the territorial government created Inspection Tiger in the hope of restoring some semblance of law and order to the forests of Primorye. Armed with guns, cameras, and broad police powers, these teams were charged with intercepting poachers and resolving a steadily increasing number of conflicts between tigers and human beings. In many ways, Inspection Tigers mandate resembles that of detectives on a narcotics detail, and so does the risk: the money is big, and the players are often desperate and dangerous individuals. Tigers are similar to drugs in that they are sold by the gram and the kilo, and their value increases according to the refinement of both product and seller. But there are some key differences: tigers can weigh six hundred pounds; they have been hunting large prey, including humans, for two million years; and they have a memory. For these reasons, tigers can be as dangerous to the people trying to protect them as they are to those who would profit from them. The territory covered by Yuri Trushs Inspection Tiger unit in the mid-1990s was centered around the Bikin (be-keen) River. You can drive a truck on the Bikin in winter, but in summer it has a languid bayou feel. For many of the valleys jobless inhabitants, the laws imposed by the river and the forest are more relevant than those of the local government. While most residents here poach game simply to survive, there are those among them who are in it for the money. _____ In 1997, Inspection Tiger had been in existence for only three years; given the state of the Russian economy in the 1990s, its members were lucky to have jobs, particularly because they were paid in dollars by foreign conservation groups. Four hundred dollars a month was an enviable wage at that time, but a lot was expected in return. Whether they were doing routine checks of hunters documents in the forest, searching suspect cars en route to the Chinese border, or setting up sting operations, most of the people Inspection Tiger dealt with were armed. As often as not, these encounters took place in remote areas where backup was simply not available, and they never knew what they were going to find. Following perestroika, virtually everything in Russia went on sale, and vast quantities of military ordnance disappeared from local armories. In the course of their raids on the many anonymous hunting cabins that dot the forest here, Trush and his men confiscated plastic explosives, TNT, and 12mm (.50 caliber) machine guns, robbed from armored vehicles. Trush could not imagine what one would do with guns that size in the forest, but the explosives were easier to explain: they were used in creeks to kill fish en masse, or to blow bears out of their dens. The Asian market is less interested in the intact skins or carcasses of bears than it is in their paws and gall bladders; the paws go into soup, and the gall bladders are used for medicinal purposes. In Primorye, in the mid Details ISBN0307389049 Author John Vaillant Short Title TIGER Series Vintage Departures Language English ISBN-10 0307389049 ISBN-13 9780307389046 Media Book Format Paperback Illustrations Yes Imprint Vintage Books Subtitle A True Story of Vengeance and Survival Year 2011 Publication Date 2011-05-03 Country of Publication United States AU Release Date 2011-05-03 NZ Release Date 2011-05-03 US Release Date 2011-05-03 UK Release Date 2011-05-03 Place of Publication New York Pages 352 Publisher Random House USA Inc Audience General DEWEY 599.75609577 We've got this At The Nile, if you're looking for it, we've got it. With fast shipping, low prices, friendly service and well over a million items - you're bound to find what you want, at a price you'll love! TheNile_Item_ID:43650141;

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