Wolf

The Lives of Jack London

Contributors

By James L. Haley

On Sale
Oct 4, 2011
Page Count
400 pages
Publisher
Basic Books
ISBN-13
9780465025039

Born a working-class, fatherless Californian in 1876, Jack London spent his youth as a boundlessly energetic adventurer on the bustling West Coast; by adulthood he had matured into the iconic American author of such still universally loved books as The Call of the Wild and White Fang. In Wolf, award-winning biographer James L. Haley explores the forgotten Jack London: a hard-living globetrotter bristling with ideas whose passion for social justice roared until the day he died. Returning London to his proper place in the American pantheon, Haley resurrects a major American novelist in his full fire and glory.

  • San Francisco Chronicle
    “[A] gripping narrative…Haley understands what longtime scholars of London have often failed to see: that London had multiple lives, and explored his own identities in his fiction.”

    Seattle Times
    “[V]ividly drawn…Haley has done a fine job. His book is a compelling story about a man who, after the death of Mark Twain in 1910, was America’s most prominent author.”
    Crosscut.com
    “In Wolf, James L. Haley gives us a terrific, compact biography that helps to restore London as a complex, prodigious writer of much (perhaps too much) more than tales of adventure.”

    Biography
    “Rough-and-tumble, passionate writer who set the stage for Sinclair Lewis and John Steinbeck captured in tumultuous color.”

    Irish Examiner (Cork)
    "Wolf is a glorious achievement which will encourage readers to seek out more about and by Jack London.”

    Dallas Morning News
    “[Wolf] reads smoothly, and for any who lack a knowledge about this iconoclastic and sensational writer of the early 20th
    century, it will make a pleasant bedside companion.”

    USA Today
    “James Haley’s fascinating biography is as much about London’s socialist politics and domestic turmoil as his best sellers.”
  • Booklist (Starred Review)
    “Careful research illuminates the creative process through which London forged such powerful works as Call of the Wild, White Fang, and The Game…[A]ny reader who shares even a spark of London’s incandescent curiosity will relish this vivid portrait.”

    Library Journal“Haley’s work is the sympathetically told story of a man unlucky in his birth to foolish parents, unlucky enough in his health to die at 40, and unlucky with women until his second wife, Charmian. Recommended.”

    Wall Street Journal“[A] valuable London biography. It surpasses Irving Stone’s 1938 Sailor on Horseback, giving us a well-delineated picture of a singular, complicated figure…These days we have little sense of the literary glory that was Jack London. Thanks to James Haley’s zeal, the author of [the fiercely imaginative Before Adam], not just the man of The Call of the Wild, is before us again.”

    Daily Telegraph(UK)
    “[Haley’s] argument is persuasive that the unexpurgated London has never been more relevant…His biography is polished, sleek, readable and pulls no punches.”

Formats and Prices

Price

$24.99

Price

$31.99 CAD

Format

Format:

  1. Trade Paperback $24.99 $31.99 CAD
  2. ebook $12.99 $16.99 CAD

James L. Haley

About the Author

James L. Haley is the author of The Buffalo War, Passionate Nation, and Sam Houston: A Life, which won nine historical and literary awards. He lives in Austin, Texas.

Learn more about this author