The Shelters of Stone - Jean M. Auel

I have done reviews of the first four books and the final book  in Auel Earth's Children series. The Shelters of Stone is the fifth in the series and not having reviewed if feels like a loose end. Since I was ahead of schedule and waiting for another recently ordered batch of books to arrive I decided to do something about it. I've read this book once before, shortly after it was released in 2002. From what I remember I wasn't that impressed with it and I suspect Auel disappointed quite a few readers with this book. It appeared 12 years after The Plains of Passage and does little other than repeating all that has gone before. While I didn't think it was as dreadful as The Land of Painted Caves, it's most certainly not the highlight of my reading year.

After a year long trek across Europe, Alya and Jondalar finally arrive at the home of his people, where the plan to mate and settle. Ayla is apprehensive about meeting his people. She worries they may not accept her and wonders if it was a mistake to leave the Mamutoi who have adopted her. She quickly finds her place among the Zelandonii though. Her unusual background ant talents gain her the attention of Zelandonii, the people's spiritual leader who intends to induct her in the mysteries of the great mother. Ayla doesn't only make friends however. The speed with which she gains the attention of the high status members of the Zelandonii gains her her share of enemies as well.

Jondalar's people occupy what is today a part of France, more specifically the Dordogne. The region is well known for its prehistoric sites and from the way Auel descibes in, it must have been very densely populated by the standards of the time. I've visited the region when I was a child, I think it was the summer of 1984 but I might be a year off. One of the places we visited was Lascaux, famous for its cave paintings. Back then the original paintings were already closed to the public to prevent them from further deteriorating but we did see the replicas in Lascaux II. I also remember seeing some of the overhanging cliffs that serve as a shelter for the Zelandonii. As usual Auel's research has been meticulous, even if she is stuck with some of her earlier choices regarding Neanderthals in particular, that by the time his novel was published were already outdated. I probably would look at the landscape with different eyes if I would visit this region again. Not everybody is enamored with Auel's tendency to describe landscapes in detail but she does have an eye for it.

One of the things that seriously annoyed me in this series as a whole is how much human development and technological advances come together in Ayla and Jondalar. The list of their inventions and discoveries is much too long to be plausible and I suspect that Auel took some liberties with the archaeological record is some cases. Fortunately Auel manages to limit herself to just one in this novel. She has Ayla discover the Lascaux caves. The paintings that have been found there are several thousand years younger than the time Ayla's story is set in, so I didn't really see the need for it. I guess we should be grateful she didn't paint them herself.

Most of the book is not about prehistoric life though, it is about status. Like among the Mamutoi, status is important among the Zelandonii. Jondalar is a high status male, son of a leader, attractive, talented and well connected. For Ayla to be suitable mate, she should match him. High status almost comes naturally to Ayla. She is, after all, practically perfect in every way. The challenges to her position mostly come from people who are jealous of her. Either low status man or women who desire something she has. They never really pose a serious challenge in this novel, as much as I disliked The Mammoth Hunters, at least Auel managed to create tension within the Lion Camp generated by her presence.

With so many people meeting Ayla for the first time, every significant event in her life up to that point is rehashed in this novel. Some events several times. Auel seems to think that because she took twelve years to write this novel, the reader will have forgotten all about Ayla. Take out the repetition and the superfluous introduction rituals and there is enough plot left to fill a novella. With so much emphasis on Ayla's position in Zelandonii society the focus of the novel also shifts away a bit from topics such as ice age ecology and techniques of survival in the paleolithic. While a lot of people feel the detailed descriptions of everyday life are tiresome, they are much more the strength of this series than dialogues or the petty drama Auel puts into her story.

Auel achieves very little in this book. You could say the only thing she does manage in this 750 page doorstopper is convince Ayla she belongs among the spiritual elite of the Zelandonii and that puts her in a position to force the loss of innocence (or in less cryptic terms the realization that sex and reproduction are linked) described in The Land of the Painted Caves on these unfortunate hunter-gatherers. Ayla brings change, she is like a storm waiting the break loose but it doesn't happen in this book. In fact, Auel would need many more pages to get to that point. With a little better plotting it might have been worth reading but as it is The Shelters of Stone is mostly filler. Not many people would be willing to plow though that many pages of ineffective writing. The only thing that saves this book for being the worst in the series is that Auel manages to outdo herself in in the final volume. It's very sad to see that a series that started with such a special novel as The Clan of the Cave Bear sinks to these depths in the final volumes.

Book Details
Title: The Shelters of Stone
Author: Jean M. Auel
Publisher: Hodder & Stoughton
Pages: 769
Year: 2002
Language: English
Format: Hardcover
ISBN: 0-340-82195-7
First published: 2001

The Plains of Passage - Jean M. Auel

The literary quality of Auel's The Valley of the Horses and The Mammoth Hunters, the second and third volume in her Earth's Children series, left something to be desired to put it mildly, so I wasn't sure if I wanted to continue this series of reviews. I've always had a soft spot for The Plains of Passage, the fourth volume, and since I recently came across an English language version (this is one of the few novels I've read both in English and Dutch translation) I decided to go ahead and reread it. My recent read of Kim Stanley Robinson's Shaman may also have something to do with it. The novels share a setting during the ice age, if little else.

After a difficult year among the Mamutoi, the Mammoth hunters, Ayla has decided Jondalar is the man for her and that if it takes crossing the continent to travel to his home is the price for being with him, she is willing to pay it. In early summer they set out on their journey. Knowing he is unlikely ever to travel that far again, Jondalar opts for the longer route that will have them follow the Donau, the Great Mother river for most of its length. It is his last chance to see his kin among the Sharamudoi people living on it's banks. Their journey will take them a full year and exposes them to every danger the unforgiving ice age environment has to offer.

The Plains of Passage can be accused of just about everything that bothered me in the previous two books. Ayla is still a Mary Sue. Fortunately, traveling doesn't give her too much time to invent new stuff although she does make a few steps in domesticating wolves. She does find the time to become fluent in three more languages despite spending weeks at most with the peoples in question. Her abilities win her admiration and several invitations to stay permanently. Despite this universal worship of her supreme abilities she still fears being rejected by Jondalar's people and is on the verge of asking Jondalar to stay with one of the peoples they meet along the way.

The repetitions that mar the later books in particular are also very present in this novel. With every new group Ayla is exposed to there is an endless string of formal introductions, disbelieve over her control of their animal companions and admiration for the inventions Ayla and Jondalar bring. After that, we usually find out what challenge is facing this particular community and what Ayla can do to fix it. Once the the proper steps are taken to fix the problem, Ayla and Jondalar are of to continue their journey. Another repetitive element in the story are the many graphic sex scenes. Personally it doesn't bother me, but in this book the scene where a young girl watching Jondalar and Ayla go at it helps her to overcome a gang rape was a bit too much for me.

Jondalar and Ayla also battle their personal demons during their journey. As mentioned before, it is her fear of rejection for Ayla. Jondalar struggles with an equally unlikely issue. He is afraid that the Great Mother won't find him worthy to create children of his spirit. He still refuses to believe in Ayla's theory linking sex and procreation and the uncertainty about whether or not he'll have offspring drives him to seek the aid of a holy man they meet along the way. He even goes so far as to try and get Ayla to have sex with another man. Given the story I guess it is consistent but it had me roll my eyes anyway.

There is plenty of about this novel I find extremely unlikely, incredibly annoying or outright ridiculous but there are a few aspects that appeal to me. As usual, Auel has done her homework. The novel contains rich descriptions of the ice age landscape and ecology. Some may find them boring or repetitive. For me, the way she describes the landscape is very interesting indeed. Some elements do turn up time and again but she has done a good job in describing the various landscapes her main characters travel through. The place might have been a bit colder than it is today, ecologically it was diverse if you know how to look at them. Picture yourself standing on the banks of the river, somewhere north of Belgrade where the Tisza river joins the Donau, trying to imagine what the place looked like some 30,000 years ago. It is quite a feat of the imagination, especially when you consider Auel describes a journey of several thousand miles this way. For some reason Jondalar's journey east in The Valley of the Horses lacked that kind of refined understanding of the environment he was traveling through.

Archaeological finds have also inspired Auel. A number of the artifacts described in the novel are based on archaeological finds. There is a big difference between the archaeological and ecological sides of this story in that the archaeological evidence is usually incomplete and lacking context. Auel built her story of people worshiping the Great Earth Mother around it and we have no way of knowing if it is anywhere near reality. In fact, I suspect she is wildly of the mark in many respects. Still, someone with an appreciation of prehistoric art and artifacts will enjoy these details in the book. Educated guesses and speculation about how these objects fitted into everyday life are part of what makes prehistory fascinating in my opinion.

The thing that most appealed to me when I first read this novel was the fact that at the heart of it, is an epic journey. It's something of a Fantasy cliche really, but one that remains quite popular. There is something about people being reduced to the basics with only their skill and ingenuity between them and disaster that makes for an appealing story. In that sense, the novel works better than Ayla facing impossible odds in The Valley of the Horses or the high school drama that fills The Mammoth Hunters.

Does that mean it's a good book? No, not really. The novel just has too many flaws for that. At best, I'd call it a guilty pleasure. It's a book that at a rational level, could be burnt to the ground in a review without requiring any great effort from the reviewer. Nevertheless, I have a soft spot for it. I don't think I would have bothered with The Shelters of Stone and The Land of Painted Caves without enjoying this book at some level. It is still more than a few steps down from The Clan of the Cave Bear however. The tragedy of this series is that Auel never managed to come close to the level she reached in the opening volume. Still, this minor step up was just enough to keep me going and even to convince me to reread the fifth book. I guess I will finish this series of reviews after all.

Book Details
Title: The Plains of Passage
Author: Jean M. Auel
Publisher: Bantam Books
Pages: 868
Year: 2011
Language: English
Format: Mass Market Paperback
ISBN: 978-0-553-28941-1
First published: 1990

The Mammoth Hunters - Jean M. Auel

The Mammoth Hunters, the third book in Jean M. Auel's Earth's Children series, followed relatively quickly after the publication of The Valley of Horses. After this one, the gap between books increase. It would take Auel 26 years to get the last three published. I guess it was a good thing that Auel took more time for the fourth book. The Plains of Passage is not up to the standard of The Clan of the Cave Bear but it certainly beats this third volume. Still, there is something very readable about these books. She never managed to get close to the level of the first book but millions have devoured the other five anyway. Unfortunately, that still doesn't make this a good book.

Ayla and Jondalar meet a group of Mamutoi, Mammoth Hunters of the Plains north of the territory Ayla grew up in. It is her first encounter with a group of people and her introduction into modern human society. In their cold and mostly treeless environment, they survive by using every part of the largest animal on the plains. Including their bones as building material and fuel. Although they are not Jondalar's people, he's met other Mamutoi before and is much better prepared to blend into their society. For it is a complete culture shock. Their relationship is put to the test when Ayla finds acceptance she's been craving among the Mamutoi, and worse, one of their men takes an interest in her.

I guess I'd better start with the major problem with this novel and get it over with. The most important plot element of this novel is a love triangle between Ayla, Jondalar and the Mamutoi carver Ranec. He is portrayed as the opposite of Jondalar and very attractive in a way. Creative, witty and charming, he has no problem getting her attention. Something that enrages Jondalar. Jealousy is one of his very few negative character traits. The whole thing is one of the steps on Ayla's quest to introduce monogamous relationship/marriage and patriarchal cultures. Some people have interpreted the series as a whole as a fall from innocence for humanity. The sexual freedom and equality between the sexes crushed between the need to make sure your children are your own.

I've never been too impressed with the idea that prehistoric man didn't know that sex leads to children but the complications and high school drama it leads to in The Mammoth Hunters is an absolute low in the series. The misunderstandings are so unbelievable that I was tempted to skim those particular passages. Unfortunately this conflict covers most of the novel. I guess you could see the crisis as necessary for Ayla to completely let go of her past with the Clan and her son who still lives among them, or for Jolandar to accept all aspects of Ayla's personality (and past). In a way Auel accomplishes quite a bit in this novel but I don't think we needed Ranec as a catalyst to do all that.

As in previous novels, Auel weaves in a lot of details on the day to day life of the Mamutoi. Leather working in particular gets a lot of attention, with ways to produce various shades and decorations being discussed in detail. As usual Auel's research is meticulous. The huge amounts of work it took to produce clothing but also things not directly related to survival are staggering when you think about it. Auel also includes some archeologies finds, a particular kind of Venus figurine produced by Ranec appears to be inspired by finds in the Ukraine. Although Venus figurines were found all over Europe, these appear to be linked to the region. A recent technical development, the needle, also makes an appearance. The production of it is quite an interesting process if you can overlook your annoyance of it being yet another innovation linked to Ayla.

Archaeological finds don't give us many clues on what kind of a society our prehistoric ancestors may have had. In some ways Auel does a good job on speculating how they would have dealt with the confinement in a small dwelling during the long winter months. In a way, they don't deal with tension between people that different from what Auel describes in The Clan of the Cave Bear, by allowing each other a surprising degree of freedom within the framework of their society. One might see it as overly utopian, a society functioning almost as a perfect democracy, but I think she injects enough darker human traits into it to make it interesting. Auel hints at raiding and even full scale war and although Ayla doesn't experience either, the strained relationship with a neighboring people shows at least some of the Mamutoi have hands on experience.Their motivations to risk fighting remain unclear however. I thought it was a subject that could have done with more attention.

The Mamutoi concept of status plays an important part in their interactions with other groups of Mammoth Hunters. It is not a subtle as the idea of status of the Clan but certainly no less complicated. Status is a source of competition but also leads to jealousy, avarice and even hat. One of the cultural concepts I did wonder about the practice of setting a bride price and how this could clash with the freedom of choice the Mamutoi women have to select their mates. The novel does not go into it in much detail but it sounds like this freedom of choice could clash with the advantages of increased status for the whole group. It seems like something that would have been worthwhile to explore.

I guess that if you can put up with the high soap opera level of this book, there are some enjoyable elements to be found in the book. Personally, I had serious trouble not being distracted by the sheer unlikeliness of the adventures of our prehistoric Mary Sue to enjoy it. There were more than a few opportunities to create some more depth in the story but Auel seems to insist on ignoring those in favor of a relationship crisis the novel could have done without. Given my preferences, The Mammoth Hunters is clearly not a book for me.

Book Details
Title: The Mammoth Hunters
Author: Jean M. Auel
Publisher: Bantam Books
Pages: 723
Year: 1986
Language: English
Format: Mass Market Paperback
ISBN: 0-553-17302-2
First published: 1985

The Valley of Horses - Jean M. Auel

Jean M. Auel's Earth's Children is one of those series of which people often say you should stop reading after the first book. I'm generally too curious about the sequel to follow that advice, so naturally I've read all six. Most of them are entertaining at some level but none of them are anywhere near as good as the first book. After the huge success of The Clan of The Cave Bear (1980), Auel produced two sequels relatively quickly, followed by three more which took her significantly longer to write. Apart from my recent reread of the first book and reading the recently published sixth novel The Land of Painted Caves, it has been many years since I've read the others. I thought it would be interesting to see how the second novel, The Valley of Horses, held up under a reread.

After being banished by the Clan, a group of Neanderthals, who have taken in and raised her as one of her own, Ayla is now forced to follow her adopted mother's advice to go in search of her own people. That is easier said than done however, in the sparsely populated steppes of what is now the Ukraine, Ayla searches for months without finding another soul. As the summer wears on, she has to make a difficult decision: continue the search and hope she'll find people or settle somewhere and prepare for a harsh winter alone.

Meanwhile on the other side of Europe, brothers Thonolan and Jondalar of the Zelandonii set out on a journey east, to find the estuary of the Danube, or the Great Mother River as they think of it. Thonolan has traveller's blood, he will not be tied to the familiar territory of his Cave in what is now France. For Jondalar however, things are more complicated. He will be drawn back to his Cave but the love for his brother and the unease of a mating everybody seems to expect, drive him on the journey. Whatever his destiny is, he will have to travel a long way to find it.

The Valley of Horses introduces a lot of the problems that would mar the later books in the series and quite a few of them are tied to the character of Jondalar. He isn't just any man, he is THE MAN. Tall, well built, supremely talented and hung like a horse, he is the dream of any prehistoric woman. If only he could find a woman who can match all that perfection. Fortunately we know of one living alone in a valley on the other side of the continent. With Jondalar, the explicit sex scenes also enter the narrative. Personally they didn't bother me, Auel could probably write decent erotica if she put her mind to it,  but not all readers will appreciate it.

To balance Jondalar's perfection, Ayla's transformation from tall, ugly and strange girl into wonder woman continues. Just about anything in this novel Ayla does, is highly improbable. The odds of surviving alone on the ice age steppes of Europe for several years are minimal, something Auel herself points out several times. Ayla not only survives, she thrives. In the process she domesticates horses, learns how to ride one and use it as pack animal, invents stitches and a quicker way to make fire and tames a cave lion. It's way too much to be believable.

Both their stories do have their strong points however. Jondalar meets a number of different people and his struggles with language, local customs and taboos are at times very amusing. The variations in the Great Mother religion, which archaeological evidence suggests was widespread in Europe at the time, are also very well done. Auel of course has had to guess what it actually entailed and later on, the details regarding human reproduction, will form another questionable recurring theme in the series. In The Valley of Horses that particular detail doesn't bother me too much yet.

Another element in this story I enjoyed is Auel's description of the ice age environment. In The Clan of The Cave Bear, Ayla lives in a more sheltered and wetter climate. In this novel she moves into the steppes that will be the setting of the next two books as well. Descriptive passages of this environment will return many times in the series and not all of them are necessary but in this novel, the environment is still new and the details on climate, meteorology and ecology are fascinating (to someone with my interest in these matters anyway). The hunt for that one large animal Ayla needs to survive her first winter alone, is also one of the stronger elements in the story. The way Auel points out just how much work hunting and processing the kill is, and how difficult it is for someone to complete the task alone and with stone age tools, lends a bit of realism to the story that the rest of the novel sorely lacks.

I guess you could say the novel has its ups and downs. Despite the copious amount of research Auel has done on prehistoric life and culture and ice age ecology, large parts of the book read like a romance novel. There are still things to enjoy in The Valley of Horses for those who liked The Clan of The Cave Bear but it is nowhere near as good. Where The Clan of The Cave Bear couples meticulous research with an emotional moving story and interesting, if not always likely, speculation on an extinct human species, this novel has to do without that special blend of ingredients, and unless you like romance novels, it does very little to replace this mix with one equally fascinating. All in all, entertaining is the best I can make of it, calling it a good read would not do this book justice.

Book Details
Title: The Valley of Horses
Author: Jean M. Auel
Publisher: Coronet Books
Pages: 588
Year: 1986
Language: English
Format: Mass Market Paperback
ISBN: 0-340-32964-5
First published: 1982

The Land of Painted Caves - Jean M. Auel

The Land of Painted Caves is the sixth and final volume in Auel's Earth Children series. It has taken her more than three decades to complete the series, the previous part, The Shelters of Stone, appeared in 2002. Auel has sold millions of books in the past thirty years, this is definitely one of the big releases of 2011. The publisher even pushed back the publication date so that is could be released in a bunch of different languages at the same date. Although her first novel, The Clan of the Cave Bear is highly regarded, the rest of the series is not as well thought of. And with reason, Ayla's story is taken far beyond what could be considered realistic, with human technological and social development making huge jumps whenever she is around. I must admit, I mostly read this book because I wanted to finish the series. My expectations were not all that high. Despite that, Auel still managed to disappoint me.

We pick up Ayla's story shortly after the end of The Shelter's of Stone. She has been accepted into the Zelandonii, the people of her mate Jondalar, and has made such an impression that she is one of the high status members of her new Cave. With status come expectations and obligations. The spiritual leader of the Cave sees in her a successor that could one day be the most prominent among all the Caves who consider themselves Zelandonii. Training to become a Zelandoni is demanding though, Ayla finds it hard to combine her training with spending enough time with Jolandar and their daughter Jonayla. She needs to find a new balance between her family live and the spiritual needs of the Cave.

This book has so many problems I don't even know where to begin. It struggles with the legacy of the five previous parts for one. Ayla has developed into a prehistoric Mary Sue and this is not easily set aside. Nor does Auel try, in the first chapter we get a nice description of Ayla's superhuman senses and that is just the beginning. Just about all of Ayla's major achievements are repeated in the book and Auel adds a few more. The suspicion that having sex is in fact related to having babies is still niggling in the back of Ayla's mind. When this fact is revealed to the Zelandonii, she sets a chain of social changes in motion that will lead to monogamy and marriage. I've always had a bit of trouble accepting that prehistoric man didn't make the link between sex and procreation. It seems terribly unlikely to me but Auel needs it to support her model of Zelandonii society. Having the entire plot of the book devoted to this issue wasn't likely to make me enjoy this book. I guess given the developments in previous books it was inescapable though. Interestingly enough, the question whether or not this change is an improvement, doesn't receive a lot of attention in the book.

A second major problem with The Land of Painted Caves is the fact that is has such a thin plot that it doesn't justify the large number of pages Auel needs to tell the story. This book is so well padded that I could believe it would be able to survive in an Ice Age climate. There are countless repetitions of events in previous books, all neatly summarized, inserted into the story. I think the author could have had a little more faith in her readers, most of them will have read the previous books. The repetitions don't stop there unfortunately. Surprise at Ayla's animal companions is included in every description of a new group of people she encounters. Ayla's accent is commented on over and over again. The Mother Song, the Zelandonii story of creation, is repeated half a dozen times, in part or entirely. There are countless lengthy introduction rituals, something Auel herself seems to get tired of, later on in the book most of them are mercifully abbreviated.

Another thing repeated over and over are descriptions of cave paintings. Ayla visits just about every major archaeological site in the region and Auel lavishly describes the images found in those caves. Auel probably put in too many but I must admit, that despite the fact that some of it was superfluous and slowed the plot of the first part of the novel to a crawl, I liked this aspect of the book. I've been in the part of what is now France once and saw some of the sites Auel describes back then. The paintings are an impressive sight. As usual, Auel has done a lot of research on this topic and it shows in the writing. Her knowledge of the period is very impressive and even if it does not always make for a good story, I deeply respect the time and effort Auel put in researching these books.

Another criticism that is usually directed at books 2-5 in this series is the copious amount of explicitly described sex. Personally it never bothered me but together with the general Mary Sue characteristics of Ayla, it does make some parts of these books read like a romance novel. People who objected to it, will be glad to hear the sex is mostly gone from this book. Despite the focus on procreation, Ayla has other things on her mind. I guess young children were a good contraceptive in the Pleistocene as well.

For the die-hard fans of this series, The Land of Painted Caves will probably be an acceptable offering. For me, the books shows so many flaws and has such a meagre plot that I had some serious trouble pushing though the last part of the book. If you are desperate to find out how Ayla's story ends, you might want to read it. For the less obsessed readers, I suggest you skip this one. Despite the impressive amount of research that is the foundation of the series, The Land of Painted Caves is one of the weakest books I have read this year. I suspect this book is going to disappoint a lot of readers.

Book Details
Title: The Land of the Painted Caves
Author: Jean M. Auel
Publisher: Hodder & Stoughton
Pages: 661
Year: 2011
Language: English
Format: Hardcover
ISBN: 978-0-340-82425-2
First published: 2011

The Clan of the Cave Bear - Jean M. Auel

Recently it was announced that the sixth and final book in Jean M. Auel's Earth's Children series, titled The Land of Painted Caves, will be released in March 2011. Set in pre-historic times, the books deal with the possible interaction between Neanderthals and our own species among other things. They are renowned for there meticulously researched descriptions of pre-historic life as well as notorious for their sexual content and the Mary Sue like development of the main character. I've read all five books available so far and although I thought the were entertaining, I do think the literary quality of the books take a nose-dive after the first novel. The Clan of the Cave Bear is quite an interesting book however, the announcement that a new book was forthcoming prompted a reread.

The Clan of the Cave Bear is set somewhere between 30,000 to 25,000 years before present, a time when temperature and sea-level were lower than today and much of Europe was either covered with ice or cold steppe/tundra environments. Modern humans shared their environment with Pleistocene megafauna and another species of human: the Neanderthal. The story opens with an earthquake in which the parents of five-year old Ayla perish. Alone, in an environment full of predators capable of devouring a human child, she wanders the forest and steppe near her home. Weakened by hunger she accidentally disturbs a Cave Lion and her cub. Ayla manages to escape but gets mauled in the process. After thirst drives her from her hiding place, she once more wanders the steppe until fever, hunger, dehydration and sunburn finally cause her to collapse.

Ayla's string of misfortune comes to an end when a group of Neanderthal, made homeless in the same earthquake that took Ayla's parents, pass by. Their medicine woman Iza can not bear to see a child suffer, even a child of the Others. Their leader, a male in his peak named Brun, reluctantly allows Iza to take the child and when Ayla wakes up she is surrounded by her new clan. A tall, ugly child by Neanderthal standards, the Clan is unsure if they should take her in. Sending her away would mean certain death however, something Brun will not allow now that an effort has been made to save her. When Ayla find the Clan a new cave, she is allowed to stay. A choice that will have severe consequences for both Ayla and the Clan.

Auel has spent an astonishing amount of time researching her series and this first books clearly shows that. Some of the research for this book is outdated by now, it has been thirty years since it was released. The difference in height between Ayla and the Neanderthals appears to have been exaggerated for instance but the rich detail in which Auel describes the ice age environment is simply awesome. The uses of various plant species, the ecology of Pleistocene fauna and numerous survival strategies are woven into her tale to give those aspects of the story a very realistic feel. Despite all this research Auel has had to fill in quite a few blanks. Even with thirty years more research available since the writing of this book, our knowledge on the period and the Neanderthal species is limited. As a consequence, there is no shortage of speculation in this novel.

One problem for Auel was that until the early eighties a lot of scientists doubted that Neanderthals would have been capable of speaking a complex verbal language. Not until 1983 a find in Israel showed that this was indeed anatomically possible for Neanderthals (which still does not prove they did have a complex language). This came too late for Auel so she solved it by proposing a way of communicating that involved signs and body language but only a few spoken words. In fact, one of Ayla's earlier challenges is learning to communicate. Another, even more speculative plot element is the neurological difference between the two species. Auel proposes that Neanderthals posses a racial memory that enables them to tap into the wisdom and experiences of previous generations. To store all this information their skull, and particularly the area that stores memories has grown to the maximum size the Neanderthal women's birth channel can handle. In effect the full capacity of their brain has been used and making further growth and gaining new knowledge impossible.

In this way Auel rationalizes the eventual extinction of the Neanderthals. Science offers us several theories on why the Neanderthals went extinct but no definitive answer. One hotly debated matter is whether or not inbreeding between Neanderthals and humans was possible. Recent genetic research indicates it may have happened but this is far from universally accepted in the scientific community. The matter of interbreeding, cleverly worked into the plot by Auel, is the subject of a stunning insight into the future of the Clan by Creb, the Clan's Mog-ur or Magician. I consider this one of the most powerful scenes in the book.

Another thing about the extinction question I noticed, is the way Auel hints at a link between the extinction of the Cave Bear some 27,000 years ago. Finds at Neanderthal sites in Switzerland, Italy and France, among other places have given rise to the theory that Neanderthals worshiped the Cave Bear. In the book Auel develops a rich religious life for the male half of the Clan in particular, based on animal totems. The Cave Bear is the mightiest of these spirits. They see Ursus, as the spirit of the Cave Bear is referred to, as the protector of the Clan. They are his people. In several places in the story Auel drops hints that these animals are getting rare, suggesting that their fates are linked. Some recent finds in Spain indicate that the Neanderthals managed to hang on a little longer but I liked the parallel and the way Auel handled the worship of Cave Bears in general.

Auel's work has received some fierce criticism over the years for the explicit ways she describes sexual scenes. The first book in the series is a bit different in that respect. For a lot of the book Ayla is too young for sex, later she is considered extremely ugly in the eyes of the people surrounding her. Despite the absence of explicit sex scenes in The Clan of the Cave Bear, I still consider the way Auel deals with sexuality in this book is still a weak element in her story. As a consequence of the Neanderthal development of racial memories and the problems storing them in the vast but still limited brain, Auel's Neanderthals show a high degree of sexual dimorphism. Their roles in society are strictly dived. The man leads, hunts, provides and protects and the woman gathers, cooks, cares for the children and provides a relief for sexual tension. Because either sex lacks the memories of the other, they are incapable of taking over each other's roles, incapable of even learning the activities of the other. It makes their society very conservative and completely inflexible. Something that is bound to clash with Ayla's inquisitive and creative nature. The inflexibility of the Clan versus the creativity of the younger human species is a comparison Auel draws numerous times in the book.

Neither the Neanderthals nor the Others have made the link between sex and procreation, which frankly is one of the least likely of Auel's speculations. Personally I can't imagine someone not making the link. Unfortunately it develops into a key plot element in both this book and later parts of the series. With sex and reproduction not linked, monogamy is not required for the Clan. Any man can "relieve his needs" with any woman he chooses. Consent of the woman is not necessary but it is considered polite to ask the woman's mate for permission. And so it is possible for Broud, one of the younger males of the Clan and in many ways the embodiment of inflexibility and blind adherence to tradition, to openly abuse Ayla. Not because of any attraction on his part, of to father a child. He does this solely to make a point. He is the man, he has the right to order her to do whatever he wishes and he will make her stay within the bounds prescribed for a woman by Clan tradition. The whole sequence that leads up to this event in the book didn't work too well for me. Broud is too much of a stereotypical cave man in my opinion, and the Clans complete lack of understanding as to why Ayla objects to this treatment does not strike me as very likely.

The struggle between Ayla and Broud in many ways represents the enormous challenge Ayla faces in fitting into this alien society and conforming to their traditions. Although there are some aspects of it I didn't like, Ayla's story does carry an enormous load of suppressed emotion. The Clan of the Cave Bear is a tragic book in many ways. A story of the demise of a species as well as ultimate failure of Creb and Ayla to bridge the gap between their species. Ayla puts a very human face on this large theme, her actions constantly underlining the difference between their species but also highlighting certain human emotions the species share. Auel carefully builds up to the crisis that forms the climax of the novel. By that point it is not entirely unexpected but the way the story plays out is heart-wrenching at times.

The combination of meticulous research and an emotionally powerful story has made this novel into something special. Although I have read the other books in the series and enjoyed them, I don't think any of these books quite manage this same mix. I can't honestly recommend the other books in the series but The Clan of the Cave Bear is an unusual novel. Not without it's flaws perhaps, but still something of a landmark. One of those books one ought to have read. It works fine as a standalone so even if the others do not interest you, give this one a try.

Book Details
Title: The Clan of the Cave Bear
Author: Jean M. Auel
Publisher: Bantam Books
Pages: 495
Year: 1991
Language: English
Format: Mass Market Paperback
ISBN: 0-553-25042-6
First published: 1980