The Tiger
A True Story of Vengeance and Survival
Knopf/Vintage, September 2010
In the Russian Far East, there is a sliver of the country that lies between China and the Sea of Japan. This is the last bastion of the Siberian tiger, and this where an unemployed logger-turned poacher named Vladimir Markov ran afoul of a big one in December of 1997. He shot it under cloudy circumstances, but tigers are hard to kill, and they have a capacity for vengeance. This tiger hunted Markov like an assassin – tracked him down, waited with a deadly patience, and killed him by his own front door. And then he ate him.
An extraordinary piece of nonfiction involving Siberian Tigers, a few men made desperate by the effects of Perestroika, and the terrifying encounters that result – all as a means of entry into some new intellectual territory.
Magnificent. . . . Suspenseful. . . . The Tiger offers readers a shiver-inducing portrait of a predator.
—San Francisco Chronicle
Mesmerizing . . . a blistering good tale, stocked with fascinating characters, none more compelling than the tiger itself . . . the adventure book of the year.
—Cleveland Plain Dealer