Furry Writers' Guild Forum

Recommended Reading

The Library
#21

Yes, it was Pamela Jekel’s book. Here’s what I’ve found.

To digress, I used to be a professional librarian, and I love reference questions.

I don’t suppose that anyone in the FWG is interested in Kipling’s first editions, since they’re extremely expensive today; but for the record:

“The Jungle Book”. Illustrated by J. L. Kipling, W. H. Drake, and P. Frenzeny. Macmillan & Company, June 1894. xii + 212 pages.
Contains 7 tales, including 3 of Mowgli, the feral man-cub of the Indian jungles. Others include “The White Seal” (seals), “Rikki-Tikki-Tavi” (mongoose & cobras), “Toomai of the Elephants” (elephants), and “Her Majesty’s Servants” (British Army pack animals).

“The Second Jungle Book”. Illustrated by J. Lockwood Kipling, C.I.E. Macmillan & Company, November 1895. vi + 238 pages.
Contains 8 tales, including 5 of Mowgli and his animal companions. Others include “The Miracle of Purun Bhagat” and “Quiquern” (both non-anthropomorphic), and “The Undertakers” (river scavengers).

Here is a more detailed description of Jekel’s book, that I had remembered as being pretty good:

“The Third Jungle Book”, by Pamela Jekel. Illustrated by Nancy Malick. Roberts Rinehart International, November 1992. 217 pages.
Contains 10 new adventures of Mowgli, Bagheera, Kaa, and the others, including such new characters as Ikki the porcupine and Gargadan the Indian rhinoceros. The last story ends with the birth of the adult Mowgli’s child, and the old-age death of Baloo.

Two other pertinent titles are adaptations of Walt Disney feature films that were published at the time of the movies’ releases, and are long out-of-print today:

“The Story of Walt Disney’s Motion Picture: The Jungle Book. Adapted from the Mowgli stories by Rudyard Kipling”, by Mary Carey. Illustrated. Whitman Publishing Company, October 1967. 190 pages.
Shere Khan, the tiger (which is “tiger king” in Hindi), hates man. He comes to kill Mowgli, the man-cub. The wolf pack decides that Mowgli must return to the man-village for his own safety. Prudent Bagheera and carefree Baloo escort him back, despite his objections and jungle dangers.

I haven’t read it in almost fifty years, but I remember being impressed that it wasn’t as juvenile as I had expected.

“The Jungle Book. Based on the script by Stephen Sommers; based on the novel [sic.] by Rudyard Kipling”, by Mel Gilden. Illustrated with stills from the movie. HarperPaperbacks, December 1994. 130 pages.
The novelization of the Christmas 1994 live-action movie, “Rudyard Kipling’s Jungle Book”. The animals are not anthropomorphized.

#22

To Poetigress: five books that all furry writers should read? Besides Kipling’s “The Jungle Book”, surely two of them would be “Animal Farm” by George Orwell, and “Watership Down” by Richard Adams. The other two – “Sirius” by Olaf Stapledon, for one. Let me think awhile for the last.

#23

It’s brilliant, isn’t it? I wish I’d read it when I was a teenager rather than when I was in my twenties.

Her other famous book is The Hundred and One Dalmatians, which I re-read every Christmas along with The Lion, The Witch and the Wardrobe.

#24

claps Isn’t she wonderful? Her character voice is stunning. So happy to find another fan of hers here (even though I see how age would have made a difference in the impression.)

Fred and Tiger, can I add to that list? Mossflower by Brian Jacques (even though Pearls of Lutra is my favorite of the series) His Dark Materials by Phillip Pullman, Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban by J.k. Rowling (which I’d be surprised if anybody hadn’t read), The Labyrinth by Kat Valente (on furries and anthropomorphism in general!) and Life of Pi by Yann Martel (sorry about that, Sean. I was told you are not a fan. :D)

#25

Five books all furries should read, in no particular order…

  1. Animal Farm

  2. Watership Down

  3. The Jungle Books (This is the title-formulation referring to both original Kipling books that I’m most familiar with.)

  4. The Island of Dr. Moreau

  5. Jonathon Livingston Seagull

#26

Read three of those five. Loved them, though JLS is definitely my favorite <3

#27

I’d like to second Fred’s mention of Olaf Stapledon’s Sirius. It’s not too well-known today but it’s a seminal science fiction book and touches on an awful lot of ethical quandaries relating to “uplifting” animals that furry fiction has dealt with since. I’d also consider Cordwainer Smith’s The Ballad of Lost C’Mell, although that’s technically a novella. (There’s a quasi-sequel novel, Norstrilia, although I haven’t read it.)

Actually, speaking of “uplifted animals,” it seems remiss not to mention David Brin’s Startide Rising, which I think may have coined the term – although not the concept – and not incidentally won both the Hugo and Nebula awards in 1983.

#28

This this this, a thousand times this.

#29

This book was most of my teenage years. I seriously can’t recommend this book highly enough - and the thousands of hours I spend on the HDM fan forums can attest to that.

#30

All of the above should be essential reads for furry authors. Here is my review of “Sirius” by Olaf Stapledon:

http://anthrozine.com/revw/rvw.patten.0f.html#sirius

Here is a book that contains both “The Ballad of Lost C’Mell” and “Norstrilia”, by Cordwainer Smith:

http://www.anthrozine.com/revw/rvw.patten.0d.html

A recent novel that most furry fans don’t seem to know about is “Albert of Adelaide” by Howard L. Anderson. I can’t recommend it highly enough. It’s a crime that it isn’t in more public libraries!

#31

I hated JLS (a teacher at my school was obsessed with it and read bits in assembly, and we all mocked her) and I wasn’t that impressed with Albert of Adelaide, but wouldn’t life be dull if everyone agreed on everything?

I always recommend Lives of the Monster Dogs by Kirsten Bakis; true furries, and a great story too.

#32

“Lives of the Monster Dogs” is good but ultimately depressing, if you can be impressed and depressed at the same time.

http://anthrozine.com/site/lbry/yarf.reviews.j.html

“Jonathan Livingston Seagull” certainly isn’t depressing. It’s the vibrant opposite. “You can be anything that you want, if you just keep trying for it hard enough!” Gee, I wanna be the King of England.

Have you read Richard Bach’s five “The Ferret Chronicles”? Equally uplifting, until you come to Bach’s statement that he is not writing fiction. He is writing the true stories of a parallel world of anthropomorphic ferrets, that are being channeled telepathically to him by the ferrets themselves; and he has more than fifty still to come! Er … okay. I did enjoy them enough that I was sorry when Bach’s publisher pulled the plug on him.

http://anthrozine.com/site/lbry/yarf.reviews.w.html

#33

Ooh, no - that sounds like something I’d enjoy a bit more than ol’ Jonathan.

#34

“Spirit of the Wolves”, by Dorothy Hearst, has finally been published; Simon & Schuster, December 2, 2014.

This is the conclusion of her “The Wolf Chronicles”, a talking wolves fantasy adventure trilogy “based on years of research”, begun with “Promise of the Wolves” in July 2009. S&S won’t send me a review copy, but the public library has it on order, so I’ll read & review it as soon as I can. Hearst’s “Promise” and “Secrets of the Wolves” are worth reading. I don’t know about your public libraries, but the Los Angeles-area libraries have them.

#35

It just struck me that I have not seen any mention of the ALAA’s 2014 Recommended Anthropomorphics Reading List on the forum yet.

http://www.ursamajorawards.org/ReadList.htm

The 2014 Reading List should certainly be looked over by all FWG members, for consideration of 2014 furry fiction worth recommending for the Cóyotl Awards, even if you don’t participate in the Ursa Major Awards. The 2014 UMA nominations will take place during late January and February 2015 on the UMA website (instructions on how to nominate there), and many furry fans use the Reading List as a reminder of worthwhile 2014 fiction to nominate. Certainly if you’ve read something during 2014 by a FWG member that you liked, and it’s not already on the Reading List, please recommend it yourself! The time for 2014 recommendations has almost run out.

#36

I echo this! I’ve sent in a few recommendations over the year. It’s only polite ;D

#37

I just peeked at the Ursa Majors RAL and noticed that all but one of the current “Recommended Anthropomorphic Short Fiction” entries were published in the first half of the year.

#38

I’ve just had my review of “ROAR 5” published. I wrote this months ago, but it was trapped in Flayrah’s backlog until I moved it over to Dogpatch Press.

#39

The Ursa Major Recommended Anthropomorphics List for last year has been updated, and I think it’s closed now.

http://www.ursamajorawards.org/ReadList.htm

#40

Closes on January 15, looks like, so still a few days to make recommendations.