The Jungle Book

The Jungle Book is a collection of seven stories, three of which (my favorites) center on Mowgli. Mowgli is a human child raised by wolves in the jungle. Mowgli learns how to survive in the jungle from his animal teachers.

The laws of the jungle are clear and the consequences of not obeying them are stark: generally death or death-like exclusion from the group.

I've never seen the movies and I knew little about the book until I began to listen to the audiobook this week. I wasn't as captivated by the other stories (the mongoose Rikki-Tikki-Tavi; an elephant-handler; the animals of the English army in India; and, oddly, the story of a seal in the Bering Sea), but I was so intrigued by Mowgli that I listened to those stories twice.

One of the 1001 Children's Books You Must Read.