This is not the author’s fault, but rather testament instead to the ever-flowing life force that is the wolf, to which so many are attracted, while others, repulsed. I love a good non-fiction, especially one that reads like a novel, and this one fits the bill. Many readers might find the shifting cast of characters hard to follow - wolves named Shy Male, 21, 42, 754, 755, 776, Middle Gray, and so on. And there are cherished, striking images here: a winter-killed bison bull, stalled out in snow so deep it couldn’t even fall over, but died standing up and was frozen in place, while the ravens and wolves circled, investigating. American Wolf takes its place in a long lineage of wolf books. The politics of ranchers - some for wolves, others against - and antigovernment zealots, hunting outfitters, Congress, courts and judges, and tourism operators all exert a sculpting pressure on where and how and if the wolf can live. But he also illustrates the far more complicated and ever-dynamic human elements affecting the wolves. These forces collide in American Wolf, a riveting multigenerational saga of hardship and triumph that tells a larger story about the ongoing cultural clash in the West-between those fighting for a vanishing way of life and those committed to restoring one of the country’s most iconic landscapes.Blakeslee does a fine job presenting the wolf’s basic biological requirements, from abundant prey source (in Yellowstone, the overpopulation of elk) to secure denning sites. She is beloved by wolf watchers, particularly renowned naturalist Rick McIntyre, and becomes something of a social media star, with followers around the world.īut as she raises her pups and protects her pack, O-Six is challenged on all fronts: by hunters, who compete with wolves for the elk they both prize by cattle ranchers who are losing livestock and have the ear of politicians and by other Yellowstone wolves who are vying for control of the park’s stunningly beautiful Lamar Valley. Uncommonly powerful, with gray fur and faint black ovals around each eye, O-Six is a kind and merciful leader, a fiercely intelligent fighter, and a doting mother. With novelistic detail, Nate Blakeslee tells the gripping story of one of these wolves, O-Six, a charismatic alpha female named for the year of her birth. But in recent decades, conservationists have brought wolves back to the Rockies, igniting a battle over the very soul of the West. Once abundant in North America, these majestic creatures were hunted to near extinction in the lower 48 states by the 1920s.

The enthralling true story of the rise and reign of O-Six, the celebrated Yellowstone wolf, and the people who loved or feared her.īefore men ruled the earth, there were wolves.

American wolf by nate blakeslee