The Clan of the Cave Bear

Summary

This novel of awesome beauty and power is a moving saga about people, relationships, and the boundaries of love.

Through Jean M. Auel’s magnificent storytelling, we are taken back to the dawn of modern humans, and with a girl named Ayla, we are swept up in the harsh and beautiful Ice Age world they shared with the ones who called themselves the “clan of the cave bear.”

A natural disaster leaves the young girl wandering alone in an unfamiliar and dangerous land until she is found by a woman of the Clan, people very different from her own kind. To them, blond, blue-eyed Ayla looks peculiar and ugly—she is one of the “Others,” those who have moved into their ancient homeland; but Iza cannot leave the girl to die and takes her with them

Iza and Creb, the old Mog-ur, grow to love her, and as Ayla learns the ways of the Clan and Iza’s way of healing, most come to accept her. But the brutal and proud youth who is destined to become their next leader sees her differences as a threat to his authority. He develops a deep and abiding hatred for the strange girl of the “Others” who lives in their midst and is determined to get his revenge.