Among Grizzlies: Living with Wild Bears in Alaska

If you liked the documentary (Grizzly Man) you will love the book 'Among Grizzlies'. Written by Timothy Treadwell, and when reading, you will feel like you are out there in the Alaskan wilderness with him. I bought a copy for myself and I also bought a copy for a good friend's birthday. This book rocks! I highly recommend it.

Ever since reading about the unfortunate event that put Timothy Treadwell and his companion on the "public map in a major way" there seemed to be more questions than answers in his life's story as it came to light. I actually thought he was Australian... Werner Herzog's stitchwork of Timothy's bear movies allowed us a very rare and wonderful glimpse into an incredible force in Timothy's life. But, the movie is only a doorway that invites anyone who is moved and inspired by it to step across the threshold and find out more about Timothy Treadwell. This book is a good next step into that world. It gives a little more insight into Timothy's own thoughts and covers a number of years worth of summers with his favorite bears. It has the unmistaken light tone of Timothy's reasoning and his adventurous nature. He describes a variety of encounters and observations, all with his youthful glee. In the literary sense there may be a lot wrong with this book, but if you liked the movie you will probably enjoy it, and that is what counts. While it still leaves a lot of questions about Timmy unanswered, it is an addition to his bear movies, and has a few self-described insights into his own personality. One can argue how much negative impact Timothy's presence had on the bears, and if you are looking for that debate this book may not be for you. To get to hear some other sides of Timothy's character and life, you'll have to read some of the other books that are available on this subject. Here, reading this book, you get to be with Timothy for a while longer, and for me it was hard to put down.

You can debate whether or not the author should have been where he was, doing what he did, especially since he was killed doing it. The reality is, this is an entertaining book. I enjoyed his stories of face to face encounters with animals that I am personally terrified of. I appreciated his support of grizzly bears and their environment and wildlife as a whole. For the brief time that it took to read this engaging book, I could not put it down. I recommend this book to anyone interested in wildlife and animals or anyone interested in a story of a human who overcomes his troubles to do the things he loves to do.

Timothy died doing what he loved... antagonizing bears to act like wild animals and eat him. Personally, my hope is to one day be torn apart by an alligator. My book, titled "Among 'Gators: Flirting with the Inevitable in Southern Florida," should be out soon. Mr. Treadwell's book is excellent for kids who have not yet developed an idea for how dangerous animals can be, as well as for hippies and fellow environmentalists. In addition to amusing us with anecdotes about himself and his fellow woodland creatures (who have now joined him in Bear Heaven), there are also enough stories about substance abuse to make anyone realize, as Mr. Treadwell suggests, that humans aren't as high as they may think on the evolutionary ladder. I can't help but wonder what combination of Tomothy's playmates--out of Booble, Mr. Chocolate, Cupcake, and the like--that the authorities had to shoot up for having devoured him. Never forget, fellow environmentalists, that it is we humans who are truly the other white meat. Well, I guess that's about it... time for me to go wake my pet tiger from his nap with a big, wet kiss on the nose. Enjoy!

Among Grizzlies is one of those books you will either love or hate, as the other reviews in this list illustrate. No, Tim doesn't have a death wish. And no, he is not faking it, although he does adorn his tale with a bit of artistic license. Just as hunters often exaggerate the danger of killing bears, and especially their own bravery and skill, Tim has accidently done the same thing in his story of his "pioneering" experiences living with them peacefully. He was far from the first to "achieve" this, just the first to write a book about it. Success in living with these grizzlies does require skills that are unusual; he learned them and you could too. An even bigger factor in success is the unusual tolerance of grizzly bears on coastal Alaska (and of black bears in most areas, especially outside Alaska) -- as Tim makes clear. Wandering among a herd of black angus cattle is riskier. An example of his artistic license is writing of being the first person into an area he calls the Forbidden Zone -- without revealing that it was actually the site of a major clamming industry in the distant past, and is regularly visited by bear-watches. He writes about how bears chose to sleep near his tent, as though attracted to him -- without revealing that he is the one who chooses to camp where they would be sleeping anyway. Claims about the closeness of his relationships with the bears need to be taken with a grain of salt. Tim does not pretend to be a scientist, but he makes many statements that could be mistaken as scientific. For example, the weight he gives for each grizzly is just a guess. When he writes about how big boars normally eat razor clams shell and all, whereas sows do not, he is apparently unaware that the few bears he watched closely for a few days aren't typical. With all those limitations, why do I give the book a 5-star rating and 3 cheers? Because it has no more limitations than most adventure books on bears, while offering a wealth of insights about grizzly behavior that will be new to the general public. It's a wonderful book, written with great warmth. It paints a much more typical picture of bears than more sensationalistic books like Kanuit's "Alaska Bear Tales" ... and "Some Bears Kill". For although such books may be carefully researched, they focus on the relatively rare circumstances where a bear attacks someone, and even rarer cases where the person is killed. Bears actually spend very little time in aggression, even against each other. Most of their time is spent feeding. Even affectionate nuzzling or play commonly occupies more time than aggression, as Tim describes with great charm. Tim is far from the only person to camp out with grizzlies on the coasts of Alaska. But he was the first to spend so many seasons (now 11) in the same areas, getting to know individual bears exceedingly well. He can identify over thirty bears by sight without having to put collars or ear tag