ISBN: 9781847081025

Synopsis This fascinating book charts the relationship between Mark Rowlands, a rootless philosopher, and Brenin, his extraordinarily well-travelled wolf. More than just an exotic pet, Brenin exerted an immense influence on Rowlands as both a person, and, strangely enough, as a philosopher, leading him to re-evaluate his attitude to love, happiness, nature and death. By turns funny (what do you do when your wolf eats your air-conditioning unit?) and poignant, this life-affirming book will make you reappraise what it means to be human.

Bookclub Review ‘Philosophy-Light with National Geographic moments’ can be dished up as a fitting description of Mark Rowlands’ memoir of his late pet-wolf Brenin, confirming the old wives’ wisdom that ‘One should not judge a book by the entrancing reviews on its cover’. Quite disappointing in its philosophical content (Rowlands is superficial, repetitive and lectures more like a secondary school teacher than a college professor) and deeply unsatisfactory when it comes to providing the reader with a lively portrait of its protagonist, the wolf Brenin, the book however serves as an entertaining summer holiday read. If one can stomach the philosopher’s deadly sin of coming up with the answers that suit him and his utilizing the wolf either as ‘babe magnet’ or ‘scare people’, the book surely gives interesting insights into the scheming nature of the simian species, the origin of morals and the misanthropic reminisces of a receding alcoholic.

The Book Club rated the book anywhere between ‘meandering, sentimental and indulgent’, concluding nonetheless that it does have ‘its moments’ and moreover contains ‘everything you always wanted to know about the sex live of wolves but were afraid to ask’.