The Clan of the Cave Bear (Earth's Children) by Jean Auel Search Amazon for other books by or about Jean Auel. Rating: Reviewed by: Kelly Davis

Series Comments:
I was leery about reading the first book in this series, Clan of the Cave Bear, because I'd seen the movie and had been far from impressed. However, I was in a cabin in the mountains at the time and was bored, so I took a chance. My friends who were sharing the cabin with me can attest to how much I loved it - I ignored all of them for two days while I read it! My first mission upon my returning to civilization was to buy the remaining books in the series.

The Earth's Children Series is set approximately 35,000 years ago - when both Neanderthal and Cro-Magnon people roamed the earth. It is obvious that Auel has done much anthropological research on this subject, and does a great job of hypothesizing how these peoples might have lived. In Auel's Series, contact between the Neanderthals and Cro-Magnons is extremely rare, and their understanding of how each other lives is so sparse that both races consider the other little more than animal. It is against this backdrop that the series follows the life of a young Cro-Magnon woman named Ayla who is rejected by the Neanderthal tribe that raised her. Ayla now must set out to find her own people - and we follow her on her fascinating journey.

As with most series, the first book was the best. Unfortunately, Auel seems to use the later novels to show the reader how much research she has done on the flora, fauna, and topography of the Ice Age. I found myself skipping pages of description to get back to the story at hand. However, I guarantee that if you read the first novel, you will hasten (as I did) to read the remaining books, and you won't be disappointed.

Volume 1 Comments:
Clan, the first of The Earth's Children series, begins the story Ayla. At age 5, she is reluctantly adopted by a tribe of Neanderthals after her parents die in an earthquake. Adapting to life in the Clan is difficult because her mental and physical acuity are profoundly disparate from those of the Neanderthals - the average Clan member could almost throw a boulder, but could barely think their way out of a cave. Though it doesn't take Ayla long to adopt their sign-language (for the Neanderthals were not capable of speech), their customs, as well as their deeply superstitious lifestyle, it takes years for the tribe to accept Ayla as more than simply an oddity. Iza, the medicine woman, and Creb, the shaman, are the only Clan members who ever truly embrace Ayla as one of their own - and through years of their training, Ayla finally earns respect as she becomes the tribe's new healer. Despite her status in the Clan, Ayla was still a female, which equaled third class citizenship, and meant that she was expected to submit quietly to anything a male Clan member wanted of her - including sex. After one such incident, Ayla gives birth, but is forced to give up her child after she is banished forever from the Clan for breaking a taboo. Now, at age 15, Ayla is completely alone and is considered dead to her Clan, only family she has ever known. She knows the only choice she has is to venture out on her own to find others like herself.