The Call of the Wild by Jack London, with an Illustrated Reader's Companion by Daniel Dyer

Vibrant, black-and-white illustrations complement London's classic adventure story about the relationship between humans and dogs, focusing on Buck, a dog that becomes a sled dog during the Klondike gold rush and, later, the leader of a wolf pack. The Call of the Wild, by Jack London, is one of America's best-known novels. In his Reader's Companion to this new edition, Daniel Dyer provides a wealth of annotations explaining the book's many "sourdough" expressions and geographical references in order to help the modern reader see what London saw. Dyer also identifies characters in the novel - human and canine alike - whom London had known, and he spices his annotations with Northern lore and tales from that astonishing time. Many of the editions of The Call of the Wild currently in print are distortions of the original text: The violence has been modified, the rough language sanitized, the punctuation and spelling modernized. This new edition duplicates the original first book edition, which London himself edited and approved. In writing the novel, Jack London did not venture far from his own experiences in California and the Klondike, and, indeed, each of the fifty place-names in the tale can be pinpointed on the maps that accompany this edition. As Buck, a mixed breed dog, is taken away from his home, instead of facing a feast for breakfast and the comforts of home, he faces the hardships of being a sled dog. Soon he lands in the wrong hands, being forced to keep going when it is too rough for him and the other dogs in his pack. He also fights the urges to run free with his ancestors, the wolves who live around where he is pulling the sled. One of America's best-known novels, this work takes as its subject the Klondike Gold Rush of 1896 to 1899. This edition includes a reader's companion. By Jack London ; With An Illustrated Reader's Companion By Daniel Dyer. Includes Bibliographical References And Index.