Let’s travel a century back in time for today’s review, White Fang by Jack London. While the novel may not be considered a classic, it has remained popular and has stayed mainstream till this day.
White Fang is a story about a half-wolf, half dog breed that is introduced to human society. The wolf-dog is given the name White Fang because of his fur and has to learn to survive in a pack that resents him because of his genetics. In order to survive, White Fang learns to not trust anyone and learns that the strong survive the hard way.
Because of all the fighting and bullying by the other dogs, White Fang uses whatever means to survive. The stigma of being wild makes fitting in impossible and because of his genetics, he is sought after by humans. We see how it is not only the pack of dogs that are cruel but also a lot of the humans in the novel.
As some of you may have recalled, I covered The Sea-Wolf by Jack London before. White Fang made London a household name and a star overnight. People and young adults in general loved the novel. The topics in the book are about the cruelty of people and the wild and morality.
London has seen a lot of cruelty in his life and you can see it in a lot of his novels. That may be why people are drawn to his books. While the books may be fiction, they are based off of real experience. It takes a great author to build a strong connection with readers and London has done exactly that in this novel.
I definitely enjoyed this book and it looks like a lot of people have to as this book is translated to 89 different languages! It is not for the faint of heart. With that said, I do recommend it and Jack London in general. His writing is unique in a field that is ever-growing.