Monday 19 March 2018

The Clan of the Cave Bear by Jean M. Auel (My Goodreads Review)

The Clan of the Cave Bear (Earth's Children, #1)

My rating: 3 of 5 stars

I found this book a little on the tedious side. I got the idea of a human Cro-Magnon modern-day infant being rescued by Neanderthal people. It was interesting at first. Gradually I lost this interest as the story progressed. I stuck with the book but found it uninspiring. Ayla, the Cro-Magnon girl, is raised by Iza - a medicine woman of the Neanderthals and her brother Creb. Creb is a deformed Sharman of the group who has survived a vicious attack of a bear. He has lost the use of one arm and an eye. Together, this brother and sister pair raise Ayla who is very different from the rest of the Neanderthal people. The story goes off on a big SJW woman thing within this caveman society. There are notions of Neaderthal people having a strong and sophisticated sign language which Ayla has to learn from scratch. She does not have the ability to learn something straight away after being shown something once. Evidently, Neanderthals could do this according to the author. All the various tribal taboos that Ayla seems to break on her journey of growing up just did not seem like a big deal. I know there are other novels that follow this, but it was not for me. It is well written but I just disliked the story and the way it developed. Others might enjoy it better than me. I've spoken to people that have a better opinion of this book than I do.


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