Summary: A 20-year-old prizefighter, about to give up the glory and fame of amateur boxing to settle down with his jealous 18-year-old sweetheart from the candy shop, sneaks her in to witness his final bout.

I love Jack London for the vividness of his words and phrasing… like how the referee uses his toe to ”flirt” the stray water bottle out of the ring.

I also love Jack for his uber-intense emotional dissections. He sorts through everyone’s feelings — even the uncomfortable ones that stay deeply hidden — to take exacting stock of exactly what’s at stake.

Here, Jack is writing about the wilderness (where he belongs), extolling the virtues of the simple life and making even the likes of me want to try camping out.

It’s a series of beautifully crafted tales about the native peoples of Alaska and the dreadful ways they fall apart when infiltrated by another culture — my culture, in fact, the merciless and insatiable white man.

And from there on out, it’s carnage! carnage! carnage! Carnage inspired by religion… carnage to avenge stolen dogs… carnage when tradition is pushed aside, when famine hits, when trade goes awry, when illness hits. And it's fabulous.

Interesting dialects, but uncomfortably racist, and a pretty average story, all told. Not worth reading.

You maybe did it first, Japan, but Aesop, Beatrix Potter, and X-Men did it better.

A thrall is a slave. This one falls in love. I’m a total sucker for viking stories, but still, this one pretty well ruled.

Magicless wizard, fireless dragon, baby-strength giant… Baum must have a thing for impotent leaders.

Summary: An ambitious animal vet takes a sketchy job with a ruthless businessman on a distant planet, only to discover that his female livestock charges are all-too-human.

So I do consider myself a feminist. But I’m not really the offendable type. This was so bad and deliberately offensive as to be just gd hilarious.

Case in point…

By the end, big boss eventually must acknowledge that Lani are people. (And by the way, if that’s the big question of the book, why put the answer in the title?) He flies into a bitter moral outrage, at once self-blaming and self-righteous. “What kind of man did you take me for?!” and such.

UM — you’ve spent centuries enslaving, selling, and breeding a race of beings that think, talk, sing, cry, and worship gods. But NOW, because you know we can inter-breed, NOW you feel bad?

“Which makes me — what?” cries Boss, clutching his head. “A murderer? A slaver? A tyrant? What am I?”

But here’s what rules: Doc — who worked to prove that Lani are human but really totally hearts Boss — leaps to his defense.

“An innocent victim of circumstances,” chides Doc.

Oh yes he did.

Ridiculous old-timey story about a hag who never worked a day in her life and abandoned every child she had in order to keep marrying new guys and live off their money. Too many words spent detailing the ups and downs of her gd bank account. I truly don't know how I finished it.

Forgettable story about a couple of crazies who venture out into the deserts of the Middle East in order to take their wrongful places as the king-gods of “Kafiristan.” Much rape and pillage ensues, but none of it is enjoyable or even okay.

Dumb story about a naïf waif cum forester cum lover cum heir who makes big lonely circles around a forest in order to guard some dumb valuable trees and thereby, quite bafflingly, earn the enduring paternal love of his employer. Too many words spent in adulation of plants and birds (for my taste, anyway).