Julie of the Wolves (Julie of the Wolves, #1)

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Julie of the Wolves (Julie of the Wolves #1)

by Jean Craighead George, John Schoenherr (Illustrations)

3.72 of 5 stars 3.72 · rating details · 24,236 ratings · 767 reviews

Miyax, like many adolescents, is torn. But unlike most, her choices may determine whether she lives or dies. At 13, an orphan, and unhappily married, Miyax runs away from her husband's parents' home, hoping to reach San Francisco and her pen pal. But she becomes lost in the vast Alaskan tundra, with no food, no shelter, and no idea which is the way to safety. Now, more tha...more

Paperback, 176 pages

Published June 6th 1997 by HarperCollins (first published 1972)

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Oct 25, 2011 Emily rated it 4 of 5 stars

This review has been hidden because it contains spoilers. To view it, click here.

4 likes · like · see review

Dec 13, 2007 Jacqueline rated it 4 of 5 stars Recommends it for: young females who like dogs

at first I thought Julie's observations of wolf behavior to be overly simplistic. It's not just a matter of adopting their vocal cues to one another that will allow you to approach a wild wolf and gain its trust and friendship.

however, after a while I attempted some of the wolf behaviors on my 2 dogs, and was surprised that they seemed to work and be understood. Imagine pippen's surprise when I bit the top of her nose the first time! heh

the grunt whine means come here.
the licking of the chin and...more

10 likes · like · see review

Mar 21, 2010 Jen rated it 2 of 5 stars Recommends it for: Chris- it has lots of poop!

According to this book, to survive in the tundra you might need to drink from a wolf's teat, collect upchucked food from furred friends, and stuff your pockets full of excrement for fuel. It also doesn't hurt to be be very, very optimistic about life and your chances of survival in general. According to Kapugen, Julie's father, when you're feeling fear you need to change your position. So, when Julie begins to fear life among a new family, she changes position by walking out into barren landsca...more

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Mar 11, 2008 Mary rated it 4 of 5 stars

Shelves: read-aloud

George's My Side of the Mountain was a huge childhood favorite of mine but I had not read Julie of the Wolves. A friend recently started a Mother-Daughter Book Group and this was the first book we took on. I read it aloud to the whole family and everyone really liked it though we found the ending hard to understand and somewhat unsatisfying. (Readers finally prevailed on George to write a sequel called "Julie" in 1994.) George delineates each wolf so distinctly that there is never any doubt whic...more

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Feb 10, 2013 "HUNGER GAMES!" (this is Sabrina!) rated it 2 of 5 stars

Book Review

I think the genre of this book is adventure. I think its adventure because Miyax is trying to find her father and stay alive. The literary element of this book is the setting. I think it is the setting because in the book it described the arctic really good like the sun looked like a yellow disk in the sky, it is a treeless place, and what season it was. The parts of this book I found interesting was when the wolves accepted her into the pack, Amaroq died, and when Miyax found her fat...more

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Apr 02, 2008 Talia rated it 4 of 5 stars

Shelves: j-fiction, newberry

Miyax/Julie is a young girl whose life is torn between the modern world of the white-man “gussak” and the old ways of the Eskimo. Troubling home situation after another, Miyax runs away into the Alaskan wilderness where she meets a wolf pack. She comes to depend on the wolf pack and love them as if they are a surrogate family, naming Miyax an honorary wolf. Knowing she cannot live with the wolves forever, Miyax must decide who she really is and what her future will be: Eskimo or “gussak”. Winner...more

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Dec 03, 2007 Cathy rated it 5 of 5 stars Recommends it for: hannah and sylvia

Shelves: newbery, banned-books

This book won the Newbery award in 1973. It is really excellent and quite an amazing story! I thoroughly enjoyed it. Because my husband LOVES Alaska so much, he also read it. Well, I love Alaska too!! We would go back there in 2 split seconds if our children weren't here instead of there.

ALSO this book has been challenged often and can you guess why? Well, these are the ones I could find:

"socialist, communist, evolutionary, and anti-family themes; references to family alcoholism, abuse, and div...more

8 likes · like · see review

Jan 03, 2009 Dan rated it 2 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: newbery-medal-winners

This review has been hidden because it contains spoilers. To view it, click here. Synopsis:

To escape from an arranged marriage gone bad, Miyax (Julie) runs away into the Alaskan wilderness. Becoming lost, she quickly realizes that she must befriend a pack of wolves, or starve to death. While she left to escape from the traditions of her forefathers, she comes to realize that it is their wisdom that will guide her through her greatest challenges. If, that is, she can survive to tell the tale.

Personal thoughts:

Of the Newbery's I've read so far, this is probably the one I liked...more Synopsis:

To escape from an arranged marriage gone bad, Miyax (Julie) runs away into the Alaskan wilderness. Becoming lost, she quickly realizes that she must befriend a pack of wolves, or starve to death. While she left to escape from the traditions of her forefathers, she comes to realize that it is their wisdom that will guide her through her greatest challenges. If, that is, she can survive to tell the tale.

Personal thoughts:

Of the Newbery's I've read so far, this is probably the one I liked the least. It isn't that it's poorly written -- it isn't. Rather, it was a bit hard for me to grasp what the author's purpose was in writing the book.

At times, it seems like a narrative version of National Geographic, explaining in excellent detail the mannerisms of wolves and how they maintain their pack hierarchies. It also does an excellent job detailing the Eskimo traditions that help Miyax to keep up with the Alaskan tundra. Yet, that doesn't seem to be the author's intention.

Really, it seems that the point of the story was meant to be a coming of age tale, with Miyax originally intending to leave Alaska for San Francisco. Yet, through the course of the book, she realizes that there is much less "Julie" in her than there is Miyax, the Alaskan born Eskimo with traditions worth keeping.

[*** Spoiler warning ***]

I suppose that the thing that left me the most unsatisfied was the way the book ends. She finds that her father, who taught her what she needed to survive, is alive. She also discovers, though, that he has given up the ways of the Eskimo, which have kept her alive. In the end, she chooses to leave him behind also, returning to the true traditions of her fathers.

But, isn't that what she was escaping from in the beginning? What of her marriage? Does she believe _that_ tradition is worth keeping? What of the benefits brought by the Americans to fight alcoholism and other problems among the Eskimos? Surely choosing between Julie and Miyax isn't so completely black and white. And yet, for her, it is. She gives up everything.

For me, it seems that what she really wants isn't life as an Eskimo, but life with the wolves, where she didn't have to deal with the multi-faceted aspects of people's lives and traditions. In short, I don't know that she 'came of age' as much as she just reverted to a childish desire to have nothing change.(less)

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Apr 23, 2013 Liz rated it 5 of 5 stars

Week 16: Defend a Book
Mijax finds herself in the Alaskan wilderness, alone, running away from a society she doesn't fit into and a husband she does not love. She finds survival along side a pack of wolves who slowly accept her into their pack. Using the skills her father taught her, Mijax struggles day to day to survive.

"Julie of the Wolves" is appropriate for ages 8+ (Grades 3+).

Number 32 on the most challenged book list, "Julie of the Wolves" is a story that I think could teach young readers...more

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Mar 25, 2013 Casey Harvey rated it 2 of 5 stars

Shelves: reviewed-books, children-s-books

George's Julie of the Wolves is not a bad book, per se. The story, a sort of bildungsroman about an Eskimo girl, is engaging. It is not a "whoa, my mind is blown" tale, but it is fine enough. My largest problem with this book is the... believe-ability of pretty much everything Julie does in the Arctic tundra. I've read a couple of other books and seen documentaries set in this frozen wasteland that depict the area as a very difficult place to survive in the best of times. Yet Julie/Miyax doesn't...more George's Julie of the Wolves is not a bad book, per se. The story, a sort of bildungsroman about an Eskimo girl, is engaging. It is not a "whoa, my mind is blown" tale, but it is fine enough. My largest problem with this book is the... believe-ability of pretty much everything Julie does in the Arctic tundra. I've read a couple of other books and seen documentaries set in this frozen wasteland that depict the area as a very difficult place to survive in the best of times. Yet Julie/Miyax doesn't actually have that hard of a time in what many might call a "frozen hell" - she never starves, runs out of fuel, lacks shelter, etc. The book reads a lot like Little House on the Prairie, where every problem is easily surmounted with a little tenacity and apparently innate know-how. I have a problem with that. How does this girl, whose memories of traditional Eskimo life are from when she is like 5, always remember something just in the nick of time that her father told her, like befriending the wolves or making traps or something? No one has that great of a memory. And there are things she does, like make traps or an igloo, that she openly admits she has never been taught (because it is "men's" work *eye roll*) - she just knows like a wolf is born knowing certain things, as if it is imprinted in her DNA. Which is crap. I just can't believe that anything she does is truly legit and that is probably what led to my disconnect from the novel. Because I can't believe it, because everything feels so contrived, I feel like there is hidden agenda at work in the novel, some kind of didacticism - be it a green plea or a legitimization of Eskimo culture - but I'm not entirely sure what that is and what it is aiming for. In that same way, because I'm not up on my Eskimo history or anything, I don't know how much of what is portrayed in the novel is a legitimate presentation of an indigenous people or what is culture rape. For both of those reasons, I hesitate to give this novel more than two stars/an "okay" rating because, in my reading career, I've learned to be cautious when I spot these markers. And I dislike didacticism that is so readily visible, even if I'm not entirely sure what it is playing at. (less)

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Mar 21, 2013 Stephanie rated it 4 of 5 stars

Yes, it has been a while since I've really liked one of the books my daughter has read. A while, that is if I discount "Wonder," which is utterly fabulous and my daughter's new favorite book of all time... but I digress.

I love a book that can transport you to another world, where you can look upon things not just with wonder but with those fresh eyes of youth. You know those eyes. You had them when you were two. They were the eyes that followed your mom around in the kitchen as she prepared a me...more

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Mar 17, 2013 Melissa Sheffield rated it 5 of 5 stars

Shelves: eng356-13-25

Miyax is a young girl who was raised by her father to be a true Eskimo. She honors the traditions of the past even when she is being forced into the world of the white man. One day, her Aunt Martha takes Miyax to live with her so that her father can go to war. Aunt Martha wants Miyax to go to the white school to learn to read and write English. There she acquires the new English name of Julie. Her father assures her that if this becomes too much that she can marry Danial, a boy who has been rais...more

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Feb 14, 2013 Taya Mills rated it 3 of 5 stars

Shelves: first-12-reads

Julie of the Wolves is a book about a girl named Julie, or Miyax in her Eskimo language, who gets lost in the Alaskan tundra and is forced to remember her Eskimo roots to survive. She encounters a wolf pack, which she studies and watches, and eventually, she finds a way to communicate with the animals. The pack adopts her as a member and shares their meat with her. Julie grows to love the pack as her family, and spends a lot of time playing and communicating with them. As winter hits the tundra,...more

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Dec 17, 2012 D.M. Dutcher rated it 1 of 5 stars

Shelves: children-s, classic, overrated

I'm surprised at how bad it is.

Julie, aka Miyax, is a thirteen year old Inuit girl. When her father is lost, and she is sent to marry Daniel, she runs away into the tundra. Her only chance of survival is to persuade a wolf pack to adopt her.

Unfortunately it's not good. It starts off with her already lost, instead of the more natural idea of her life beforehand. This happens in the middle of the book. There's a few anachronisms: would an Inuit girl say "oh, wow," or "scared me to death," know abo...more I'm surprised at how bad it is.

Julie, aka Miyax, is a thirteen year old Inuit girl. When her father is lost, and she is sent to marry Daniel, she runs away into the tundra. Her only chance of survival is to persuade a wolf pack to adopt her.

Unfortunately it's not good. It starts off with her already lost, instead of the more natural idea of her life beforehand. This happens in the middle of the book. There's a few anachronisms: would an Inuit girl say "oh, wow," or "scared me to death," know about antifreeze, or see girly white people magazines, even if the timeframe is a bit ambiguous?

The prose feels clunky, too. Like it's trying to be evocative but sacrifices simplicity for it. Without a slow build up, Julie being adopted by the wolves doesn't feel as natural as it could be, and it's implausible as it is that a young girl like her would run off into what could easily be sudden death, yet know enough to survive in it when she has to. Those same skills would tell her not to do this, and that's why many survival tales start with a person being shipwrecked or forced to survive.

Finally, the book is filled with what I'd call Newberry bait: relatively pointless things that grab the attention of the Newberry Awards because they are transgressive or different. Inuit girl (yet calling herself an Eskimo) check. Mentioning child marriage and marital rape, check. Mentioning alcoholism, check. Killing a dog (wolf, in this case,) check. Vaguely girl-empowering paean to nature, check. The second is a bit bewildering, as it's so out there considering the audience is going to probably be ten or under, and is why it earns its banned status despite being not explicit.

Island of the Blue Dolphins, while not perfect, is far better at a similar kind of tale with less transgression and cleaner prose. I didn't really expect this book to be as bad as it was, and I had no memories of it as a child whether good or bad to counteract this. I'd pass on it unless you are trying to read all the Newberry Winners.(less)

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Dec 14, 2012 Laura Larsen rated it 5 of 5 stars

Julie of the Wolves by Jean Craighead is an adventure and series. A sequel to two other book called Julie. This book has won the Newbery Medal. Also has over 21144 ratings and 717 reviews. Published in 1972 and is a book for kids without being so fantasy like. This book is filled with adventure, drama and a lot of twists. Julie of the Wolves is about a 13 year old girl who lost her dad when she was younger. Forced to live with her aunt until she was able to marry the man that was arranged for he...more

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Dec 07, 2012 Debbie rated it 3 of 5 stars

This unusual story of a 13-year-old Eskimo girl who survives in the Canadian Artic by ‘joining’ a wolf pack won the 1973 Newbery Medal. Julie of the Wolves is set in Alaska in what seems to be the early 1970s.

Miyax/Julie (they all had two names, Eskimo and English) leaves an arranged marriage and sets out with some food to walk to her pen pal’s house in San Francisco. On the way, she learns self-reliance through the traditional ways, and finds her father.

Although it’s complimentary to the tradi...more

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Nov 17, 2012 Stephanie Koerner rated it 5 of 5 stars

Grade/interest level: 6th-8th
Reading level: 860L
Genre: Adventure, Realistic fiction

Main characters: Miyax(Julie), Amaroq(Wolf Leader), and Kapu(Leader of Pups)
Setting: Alaskan tundra
POV: Narrator

Summary:
In this adventure packed book, a girl named Miyax is lost in the Alaskan tundra after running away from her terrible marriage. She is only a young teen, but has deep Eskimo values rooted deep in her being. When Miyax fears she will die without food she studies a wolf pack and soon is able to comm...more

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Nov 15, 2012 Staphany Ramirez rated it 4 of 5 stars

This book certainly deserves the new-berry medal, this is such an amazing book. I certainly loved this book with the passion. The main character, Miyax is just a very gutsy young lady. The things and journey that she goes through just keeps me amazed through out the book. Miyax, has a very genius plan. She becomes a member of a pack of wolves that she finds. Being part of the pack of wolves gives her access to food that is required for her to survive. So she analyzes the wolves first and then ac...more

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Sep 25, 2012 Mitchell rated it 1 of 5 stars

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Sep 07, 2012 Jenna added it

Shelves: read-in-2012

I remember loving this book as a kid and having to re-read for a children's literature class has been a blessing. I was raised in Alaska, but not the far north of Miyax's home. I have seen the tundra landscape and so in reading the words again I was reminded of their stark beauty. It also brought to mind the feeling I have now that I live in the opposite climate in the desert of Nevada.

Sure I could pick apart some of the details that I have seen in other reviews but I am not going to. In some...more

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Aug 28, 2012 Book Concierge rated it 5 of 5 stars

Julie Edwards Miyax Kapugen is a 13-year-old Eskimo girl on the cusp between childhood and womanhood, between traditional life and modern “white” life. Orphaned and living with an aunt she dreams alternately of the years she spent living with her father at a small village and of San Francisco and the pink “mansion” where her pen pal Amy lives. She is married at thirteen to the son of her father’s good friend, an arrangement that had been made years previously, but Daniel is not a suitable husban...more

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Aug 02, 2012 Kate Z rated it 3 of 5 stars

Read this with Will as an alternating read so my rating reflects it's appropriateness and level of engagement for an almost 7 year old nature loving, on your own adventure seeking boy.

Overall this book is probably better for a more mature child - able to "get" more of the nuances of life. Julie (MIyax)'s story is more a story of culture - of an "old" way of life in conflict with a "new" way. Will "got" this but only on a limited basis. In the end he understands that the "gussak" (read: American)...more

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Apr 29, 2012 Eric rated it 5 of 5 stars Recommends it for: young readers

This book reminded me of "Hatchet" by Gary Paulsen that I read as a child. This book showcases how one person, Julie/Miyax, can learn to live off the land and commune with nature in a way that most of us are not able to do. George makes the moments where Julie finally starts interacting with the wolves believable because they are rooted in behaviors that we can understand. She creates something that isn't fantasy-based like many children books of our modern day. This feels like a book that could...more

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Feb 11, 2012 Andrew Shuping rated it 3 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Electronic copy provided by NetGalley

Miyax is a a thirteen year old Eskimo girl who when her father vanishes is sent away to be married to a boy she doesn’t know. Unhappy in this new world she flees from her home to try to find her way to her pen pal Amy in San Francisco. But Miyax soon gets lost in the Alaskan wilderness and she’ll only be able to survive if she befriends the wolf pack nearby. Will the old Eskimo ways help her survive and make it to San Francisco? Or will she perish in the cold...more

1 like · like · see review

Feb 08, 2012 Tyler rated it 1 of 5 stars

Shelves: never-again, award-winners

My younger brother is a rather picky eater. When he eats something he doesn’t like, he clamps his nose with two fingers and swallows the food as quickly as possible while suppressing the gag reflex. For him, some foods just don’t go down as easy as others.
For me, Jean Craghead George’s Julie of the Wolves could hardly go down at all.
It’s a quick and easy read, for ages 10 and up, coming in at about 150 pages, and to be honest, that’s all I could bear.
This 1972 Newberry award winning novel show...more My younger brother is a rather picky eater. When he eats something he doesn’t like, he clamps his nose with two fingers and swallows the food as quickly as possible while suppressing the gag reflex. For him, some foods just don’t go down as easy as others.
For me, Jean Craghead George’s Julie of the Wolves could hardly go down at all.
It’s a quick and easy read, for ages 10 and up, coming in at about 150 pages, and to be honest, that’s all I could bear.
This 1972 Newberry award winning novel shows the effects of the world’s urbanization on the native Inuit tribes. But instead of making this book heartwarming at all...it just comes off as being depressing.
The storyline follows a young Eskimo girl with a near-unpronounceable name, Miyax. She studies wolves, and attempts to “learn their language,” a skill that sounds weird on paper, and is even weirder in practice. She was set up to be married to a man who is quite a dweeb and a rapist, so she runs away into the artic and sets off a string of highly depressing prose.
Although if there’s something that George gets right in the course of the book it’s her writing style. She describes the landscape of the artic with such majesty and sophistication that I can’t help but gape at the mental picture she paints. The unfortunate catch is that there is no substance to back up this beautiful diction, the characters were clichéd, the storyline uninvolving, and the ending abrupt and awkward.
And speaking of awkwardness, this book was the 32nd most-banned book from 1990-1999, according to the ALA.
Why?
At the end of Part II there is a scene depicting an attempted rape between two characters, Myax (now Americanized and re-named Julie) and Daniel, (the guy she marries). According to Banned in the U.S.A. an incident occurred in March 1996, when the book was removed from the sixth grade reading list in Pulaski Township, Pennsylvania at the behest of parents who “complained of a graphic marital rape scene in the book.” This really surprised me, why on earth would they include a scene about a rapist in a children’s book? I didn’t even know what rape meant until I was in 9th grade… Yet, there it is. I’m totally against censorship, but I don’t really think that this book is suitable for 5th grade readers (its target audience).
While there are two more installments to this trilogy, I will definitely not be reading them. This book can go just below other similar pieces of repulsive literature, such as Stephanie Myer’s Twilight Saga and Nathanel Hawthorn’s The Scarlet Letter. To Quote Jean Craghead George herself, "the hour of the wolf and Eskimo is over.” Frankly, the hour doesn’t even start.
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Jan 31, 2012 Kerri rated it 3 of 5 stars

Shelves: young-adult

For the better part of a week I was convinced I was never going to be able to finish traipsing through the 201 pages of this book, and even when I realized I was too stubborn not to finish, I remained convinced I was never going to enjoy the story. Touché, Jean Craighead George. Touché. While George ended up hooking me, she didn't successfully do it until page 120, and until then I was sure I'd been wandering the Arctic tundra for three lifetimes waiting for the real story to unfold.

While I can...more

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Oct 01, 2011 Zion Martin-hayes added it Recommends it for: people on an air plane

Recommended to Zion by: My teacher

Julie of the wolves review

In my opinion this book was not a very good book but I still think there are some important details like the literary element.

LITERARY ELEMENT: I think the literary element is the plot because the plot to me is mainly about a girl and a wolf trying to be friends. Which was interesting.
GENRE: Fiction
IMPORTANT DETAILS: I think when the author said that “the wolves were there when she went to sleep, but when she awoke they were gone.” I think it is symbolism for when her...more

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Sep 26, 2011 Timothy Grossano rated it 4 of 5 stars

This book starts in medias res. Julie (better known as Miyax) is lost on the tundra, starving. She remembers the lessons her father, Kapugen, taught her to survive. Of those lessons one is that the wolves, noble and loyal, will help her if she learns how to speak to them. This book holds no punches. Her first meal in weeks is regurgitated from the "belly basket" of a mother wolf.
The story is told with grit and realism. Much of it is shocking. There is challenging subject matter addressed freque...more

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Sep 12, 2011 Mai Person rated it 5 of 5 stars

Shelves: 40-book-challenge-gr7

It was such an amazing book. At first I really didn't like Julie but I soon grew to understand why she was like that and the ending is so sad. :')

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Apr 28, 2011 Melissa rated it 4 of 5 stars

Shelves: young-adult

Julie of the Wolves is the 1st in a series about a young Eskimo girl named Julie/Miyax and her joining with a pack of wolves. The books don't necessarily have to be read in any order, but it makes the most sense to start with this as the first. Its a great series for animal lovers and children, and even adults can get some enjoyment out of it.

Julie has run away from her husband at the tender age of thirteen. She cannot stand living with him any longer but doesn't realize what trouble she's gotte...more Julie of the Wolves is the 1st in a series about a young Eskimo girl named Julie/Miyax and her joining with a pack of wolves. The books don't necessarily have to be read in any order, but it makes the most sense to start with this as the first. Its a great series for animal lovers and children, and even adults can get some enjoyment out of it.

Julie has run away from her husband at the tender age of thirteen. She cannot stand living with him any longer but doesn't realize what trouble she's gotten herself in until she realizes she has become lost in the arctic wilderness. Running out of food Julie stumbles across a wolf pack and hopes that if she can befriend them they will provide her with food. She watches and learn to mimic their movements and communicate with them until they accept her as one of the pack. But she can't stay with them forever, once the pups are grown they will be moving on and Julie must find herself somewhere to go as well.

Julie is a strong brave character who shows real empathy with animals. I enjoyed reading about her and I thought that the author through her expressed some unique views of the Eskimo people (called Eskimo's in this book, not Inuit). It was an interesting glimpse into the culture. The wolves weren't near as developed but I can sympathize with the author on that considering she's never been a wolf. She did express the pack hierarchy well though and each wolf was described somewhat differently from the others.

Since this is a children's book it is appropriate for them although there are some parts that may cause confusion. Julie being married at thirteen just being one of those questions. It is a great book for trying to learn to relate with animals though and Julie as a protagonist is a girl that can be looked up to. While I would have liked to see more detail and had the book be a bit longer, it was still very good.

I'll have to go find the rest of the series now that I've read this one. I love animals and wolves are especially interesting to me so this is good reading in my opinion!

Julie of the Wolves
Copyright 1972
170 pages

Review by M. Reynard 2011 (less)

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About Jean Craighead George

Jean Craighead George wrote over eighty popular books for young adults, including the Newbery Medal-winning Julie of the Wolves and the Newbery Honor book My Side of the Mountain. Most of her books deal with topics related to the environment and the natural world. While she mostly wrote children's fiction, she also wrote at least two guides to cooking with wild foods, and an autobiography, Journey...more

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On the Far Side of the Mountain (Mountain, #2)

Julie's Wolf Pack (Julie of the Wolves, #3)

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