Title: A Companion To Wolves
Author: Sarah Monette, Elizabeth Bear
Publisher: Tor Books (Tom Doherty Associates, LLC)
Cover Artist: Mary A. Wirth
Amazon: Buy Link A Companion to Wolves
Genre: fantasy
Length: 302 pages (hardcover)
Rating: 5 out of 5 stars
A Guest Review by Feliz
Summary Review: This engrossing animal-companion fantasy novel about the coming-of age of a young warrior might not be for everyone due to its sometimes brutal explicitness.
**** WARNING: This book contains scenes of violence and on-page dub-con sex between multiple partners ****
The Blurb: A Companion to Wolves is the story of a young nobleman, Isolfr, who is chosen to become a wolfcarl — a warrior who is bonded to a fighting wolf. Isolfr is deeply drawn to the wolves, and though as his father’s heir he can refuse the call, he chooses to go.
The people of this wintry land depend on the wolfcarls to protect them from the threat of trolls and wyverns, though the supernatural creatures have not come in force for many years. Men are growing too confident. The wolfhealls are small, and the lords give them less respect than in former years. But the winter of Isolfr’s bonding, the trolls come down from the north in far greater numbers than before, and the holding’s complaisance gives way to terror in the dark.
Isolfr, now bonded to a queen wolf, Viradechtis, must learn where his honor lies, and discover the lengths to which he will to go when it, and love for his wolf, drive him.
The Review:
Let me say in advance that this book is not primarily a romance, even though it ends with the hero in what I’d call a loving relationship. The bond between Isolfr and his wolf, Viradechtis, is every bit as important as the different relationships between Isolfr and the other wolfbrothers as well as between Viradechtis and the other wolves. Mainly, though, this is a very well-crafted “classic” fantasy tale about epic battles against mythical forces with heroism and cunning, about friendship, love and loyalty and about a young man finding his place in his world.
Imagine a world very alike to Old Iceland, populated with trolls and wyvern snakes, giant fighting wolves and humans who resemble the vikings of old. There are Earls, and villagers, and there are the wolfcarls, warriors who are mythically bonded to giant wolves and can converse telepathically with their wolves and with each other. The wolfcarls defend the humans against the trolls, beings so powerful only the united forces of men and wolves can defeat them.
Njall is the eldest son of an earl. When the wolfjarl, the head of the wolfcarls, claims Njall as part of the thrall, the earl objects – not only because Njall is the heir, but also because the earl despises the customs and manners of the wolfcarls who are known to lie with other men.
There is indeed this catch to being a wolfcarl, that they are all men, but some of them are bonded to female wolves. When the wolves mate, the men will also have sex, which means that the ones bonded to female wolves will be taken by the others.
As the young nobleman nevertheless chooses to join the wolf-warriors, his father disowns him, claiming that a man who is ready to lie down for another man can’t have no worth and no honor. Although Njall agrees with his father on this – he’s been brought up to the same moral values, after all – he can’t not heed the call of the wolves, determined to serve his duty in defending his people. With most of the wolves being males, what are the chances that a female wolf will bond with him?
Yet, that’s exactly what happens. Bonding with his wolf-sister Viradechtis, Njall changes his name and becomes Isolfr.
Even knowing what it means to be bonded to a female wolf Isolfr takes comfort from the thought that his wolf sister is worth everything – until he witnesses the violent reality of the mating ritual for the first time. It doesn’t even help that Isolfr experiences pleasure under the considerate guidance of other wolfcarls; his deeply ingrained feelings of shame and dishonor are hard to overcome.
Isolfr almost breaks under the necessity to give himself to other men. But then the trolls come upon the humans, and the whole world as Isolfr knows it threatens to be destroyed. Isolfr realizes his place in the world and his worthiness as a man has nothing to do with whom he surrenders to, but everything with the reasons why he does it.
This book was different for many reasons, and I can see why some may find it difficult. Particularly the sex scenes might be bothering people. Without being outrightly raped, Isolfr isn’t always entirely consensual when it comes to having sex with other men (although he gets to be the active part, too, and indeed finds pleasure in the act). But the world he lives in is violent and cruel, not only to Isolfr, but in general, and the forceful mating rituals fit the setting.
The way Isolfr grows into his role – as his wolf sister is destined to become a pack leader, Isolfr will be a leader of men, too – and finds his place in this very different and complicated world is part of the magic of this book.
Not one single time did Isolfr act out of character; he was entirely plausible and so were the other men – and the wolves who are personalities in their own rights. The wolves are just “human” enough to make it plausible for them to bond with men, but they always remain animals. No pathetic fallacy, the wolves are cruel and single minded and living in the moment like true animals.
The worldbuilding was fantastic, totally transporting the reader into it. The story itself, with the deadly threat of the trolls forging an unlikely alliance out of men, wolves and mountain smiths (elf-like creatures of great power), was solid, well crafted fantasy, nothing new but original enough to be exciting.
I had some minor issues, too. For once, most of the names suddenly changed after one third of the book; there were a lot of names, and most of them quite complicated AND quite similar since most of the men are named “wulf” in some way or the other (- olf,- olfr, Wulf-, Ulf-…) while the wolves bear random names from which not even the wolf’s gender is always easy to detect. The name and character list on the first page was actually very necessary. For another, there were many vaguely “nordic” sounding words strewn in, and while most of those were detectable from context, they were often tongue twisting monsters like “wolfmaeghtthing” or “wolfsprechend” and not that easy to memorize. A glossary would’ve been helpful.
Although the battle ended as foreseeable, the war wasn’t yet won. The story felt open ended, particularly on Isolfr’s part. His development wasn’t finished; although he’d made some kind of peace with his role in the wolfheallan, he was still struggling with the sexual implications this entailed.
(There was a sequel released only recently, “The Tempering Of Men”, in which hopefully the open threads will be connected in the end)
A Companion To Wolves is a personal favourite which I’ve read several times since its release in 2007. It’s a compelling, suspenseful book, recommended for everyone who loves good, well – crafted fantasy. Once again, it isn’t for the faint at heart though; people who take objection to dub-con and violence might chose to pass on this.
Good review, Feliz! And, it appears, interesting book. Thanks, I’m putting it on my reading list. Also, I found out that this will be a trilogy (at least), with the third book titled An Apprentice to Elves (to be released in 2013).
I heard as much, too – I’m going to read the sequel soon. A warning: on the publisher’s page the sequel, The Tempering of Men, costs $12.99 (the EBOOK! the hardcover is somewhat like $25).
Ugh, did not like this one.
sorry to hear this. Still, I can see why this book might raise contrasting opinions.
Alright, this sounds like a complicated book and in a way reminds me of a Rachel haimowitz book. I’m intruiged, though I’m not entirely sure it would be a good idea for me to read this book.
I did really like your review! It’s awesome!
thanks Larissa – it’s complicated insofar as the names are a mouthful, each and every one, and characters are often introduced shortly and then disappear only to pop up several dozen pages later, which left me scratching my head thinking WHO was that again? The story in itself is quite simple, it’s the old battle good against evil, locals against invaders.
However, I’d only suggest you read this if you don’t mind the violence. It’s really very present throughout the book.
Great review Feliz.
Since I read the het Wolf Tales series by Kate Douglas a long time ago I have had an affinity for wolves, so I will be putting this book on my To Buy list.
Hi Wave,
I think the authors did a good job in translating what could be called the inner workings and politics of a wolf pack into something that could actually work as a combined wolf/ human pack. I found the wolves particularly well-drawn, and the mating scenes, while they could appear disturbing on fist sight, were “realistic” in the context.
I loved this book. As someone who has always been a big fantasy reader and when i was younger read all sorts of animal companion books and also now really enjoy m/m, finding this book was a real treat (in the dirtiest most irreverent, omg my childhood animal companion novel grew up and now takes it up the ass way). The authors took the old companion novel and said what would it be like if instead of the animal being just the perfect friend that fits seemlessly into your world, what if it was you that had to adapt and fit into your animal companions world.
Of course the icing on this fantastically dirty cake is the fact that these two women can WRITE!
Yes indeed – the fact that the humans have to adapt is a big part of what makes this book so unusual and fascinating.
😀 You know this book might not fit in the M/M only box seeing as Isolfr greatest love in the novel is Viradactis who is female. 😉
just sayin’
don’t think four-legged counts, does it? 😉
Thanks for the review. I don’t have a problem with dub-con but complicated and similar character names annoy the hell out of me.
I once cracked open the DRM on an ebook just so I could go in and replace all the weird names with ones I could easily follow. So Bouellebecq become Bob and so on.
But you mentioned there is a character name key, so that might help. I think I’ll give this one a try.
😀
dumb question, what’s DRM? 😕
If you’d think of doing something similar here, you’d have your work cut out for you. There are really many, many names! ❗
Enjoy, Diane!
DRM stands for “digital rights management” and it is the software protection publishers put on ebooks to keep people from pirating them.
I don’t pirate books, but sometimes I like to edit them. Replacing names is a simple find and replace macro.
Usually I just want to delete an ugly cover or cut-off the publisher’s promotional chapters… but sometimes I change the names, especially if I know someone with that name and I can’t get that person out of my mind when I’m reading.
:escape:
oh God, I can relate to this! If I read a book where the young hot studly hero had the same name as, let’s say, my 75 year old potbellied neighbor you’d see me run screaming from this book! 😀
This is exactly the kind of book I wouldn’t normally read, but some reviews made me give it a try a year or so ago, and I was very glad I did. I’ve read it twice, and will probably read it again. Yes, it’s harsh, but that’s the beauty of the book. It’s completely true to the environment these people live in. As for the names, all the boy’s original names are changed when they bond with the wolves, so it’s best to just forget them and make a few notes to keep track of who’s bonded to which wolf.
This isn’t normally the sort of story I’d like, but it was recced to me by someone whose taste I trusted, and I did enjoy it. Here’s what I wrote about it when I read it in 2008:
“I agree with other reviewers: the names of the wolf-carls and the wolves are very confusing and hard to remember. It would’ve been good to have had something added to the names of the wolves to indicate more easily that they ARE wolves. The fact that each wolf-carl’s name changes as they bond with their wolf companions adds to the difficulty in remembering who’s who. A wolf genealogy would also be helpful. I found it hard to follow at times, but the plot and writing were good enough and interesting enough to keep me reading.
Apparently some readers found the sex scenes graphic, but I didn’t see them as being overly so. I’ve read worse in fan fic.
I recommend this, but suggest that if you get hold of a copy, you keep a pen and paper close by, to list the characters and who they connect up with, or do what I did – I copied the list of characters and used it as a bookmark, to save having to turn back to the front of the book all the time. It was still confusing though, due to the characters changing names along the way. I still found it hard to keep track all the time. But I never gave up, I liked the story too much to do that.”
I didn’t know there’s a sequel now, so I’ll be sure to check that out. 🙂
sound advice, Gaycrow and Catana. For some books it’ 🙄 s indeed wise to read with pen and paper ready…
Hmmm, after reading more reviews on goodreads will have to pass… Seems like a book of dubious content…
Very good review though 🙂
Thanks Hellga, although I loved this book i can see where some scenes might bother people, so if you think you might feel thusly it#s better you give this a pass.
I recently finished a really good epic fantasy and am in the mood for more. Great review, Feliz. This one’s going on my list. I don’t mind darkness in my reads as long as it’s in keeping with the story.
Enjoy Eden! I’d appreciate it if you came back and let me know how you liked it. I’d guess you might – like it that is. 🙂
I have to say I didn’t get very far with this book. Dub-con doesn’t bother me, in fact that’s a trope I like. But, the confusion of the names and how they changed at one point just turned me completely off. I couldn’t keep any of the characters straight in my head as to who was who.
Those names are part of the magic of this book, but also its biggest difficulty. it’s like a nordic saga, but with much more cast.
I really liked your review Feliz. I have to admit though that I passed on the book some time ago and I doubt I will be changing my mind. However I thought that “Melusine” series by Sarah Monette were amazing. Those were also quite dark and pretty much character driven stories (with magic and other stuff) but I loved it a lot. I do recommend at least taking a look. Those are not exactly mm, although one of the main characters is gay and he has relationships 😉
Hi Sirius,
after reading “companion”, i bought the melusine books. got until the virtu and gave up then, too little action for me 🙂
I loved this book and have just purchased the sequel. I agree about the name confusion but as a long time fantasy reader it didn’t bother me. I loved that this is a story about how a man defines his honour and then tries to live the life that is created by the choices he has made. So in this book while the sex was tough, it was appropraite to the story and the world building – in the end it didn’t read as dub-con to me.
It was also an exploration of humans adapting and being adapted to their trell wolf counterparts. So we have the mainstream society which seeks to control it’s environment and the wolfcarls who became a part of it.
Great review. Thanks.
I agree with you, it didn’t read as dub-con to me either. Harsh for sure but Isolfr inner monologue made it clear that he could walk away and there were moments that the thought was there and like you say it was all wrapped up in his honor and what he would be willing to do for his wolf.
Thanks for the review, Feliz! Think I’ll try a sample, but sounds like it might be worth a closer look!!
I loved this book and have read it a couple times. Picked up when it first came out. Fit real well with my reading tastes of sci-fi/fantasy, which is how I became an avid reader way back in high school(got hooked on Anne McCaffrey’s Pern series and haven’t stopped reading since).
Almost reread this a couple months ago, but I knew the sequel was coming so I waited. Didn’t know it was going to be a trilogy though. Will definitely have to write that up on my long term wish list.
some reviewers on GR compared this to the PERN series. I’ve only read one Pern book but I’d say there are indeed certain similarities, so if you liked Pern, this might be also one for you.
I read this a while ago and really liked it. Thanks for the heads up about the sequel!
A word about the sequal, i just finished it and it was good but it wasn’t in Isolfr perspective, it was nice to see what other characters were thinking but for me it lost a lot of omph seeing as how Isolfr voice is what MADE the last book. It also ends on a cliffhanger i think that the second and third books probably should have been just one. It was a little bit disappointing because i loved the first so much, so my recommendation is just go into it looking to enjoy learning about the characters a little bit more with not terribly high expectations and it will be an enjoyable read.