Hunted

by David Fletcher

At the outset of a solo climb up Alaska's Mount Hess, veteran mountaineer Fletcher had been warned never to underestimate the grizzly, because "they are mean, they are natural killers, and above all, they can think." In this incredible true-life adventure, Fletcher recounts with breathtaking vividness his battle with a giant grizzly bear that stalked, hunted, frequently outwitted, and, finally, attacked him furiously.

Genres: Nonfiction, Animals, Survival

224 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 2002

About the author

David Fletcher is a historian at the Tank Museum at Bovington and has written a great number of books on British armour.

Reviews

[Michael · Rating 2 out of 5]

Well... this a story about a man who gets lost on a solo climb in Alaska. Accidentally kills a bear cub in a white out snow flurry, and is hunted by the cubs mother for most of his journey. I personally think he made the story up. And also I have read a lot about bears... and I seriously doubt a mother bear would let her cub roam around alone during a white out. The mother would have been snuggled up with her cub in a safe place. Or close enough that when this guy "accidentally" killed it, she would have taken his head off right then and there. There would have been no pursuit(In my opinion). Plus the writing is obviously done by someone with no writing skills. I'm NOT calling this man a liar... I'm just saying I don't believe him.

[Steve · Rating 1 out of 5]

My wife and I like to read survival stories, in particular stories involving bears and this story just did not roll off the pages well. It seemed contrived, even to the point that I doubt it's authenticity as a true story.

[Kirsten · Rating 3 out of 5]

The story is fascinating, I will give the author that! But never having climbed, the constant use of mountaineering terms came across as very unreadable. The glossary at the back helped, but trying to keep the terms straight in my head was very tiresome. If you're a climber, though, you might find it considerably more interesting! Also, I felt like the author got into the bear's head a little too much. I do tend to anthropomorphize, but this one took it a bit too far even for me.

[Jeremiah · Rating 4 out of 5]

Great book, Amie got this for me and it was right up my alley. Unbelievable story.

[Rod Mathewson · Rating 1 out of 5]

This supposed experienced mountaineer makes so many avoidable mistakes that I started to root for the bear.

[Obeth · Rating 3 out of 5]

The book i’m reviewing is called Hunted a true story of survival. This book is about a man that wants to challenge himself by climbing a mountain called hess in Alaska. This book made believe that bears are really smart and could be one of the smartest animals in the world. Also another part of the book made me believe that David Fletcher was lying about him killing the cub to make it more interesting. Because without that the bear would have no reason to follow him. I believe he just saw a bear and the bear saw him and nothing happened. I only read half of this book and got really boring. It kept saying the same thing. Waking up, climbing mountain setting up his tent and eating. The author should talk more about him in the beginning of the chapters so we can understand the rest of the story. Instead of just going onto the alaska trip. He should of talk about the setting because the setting sets up the mood he did not set up the mood. Also his writing skills are not good because he doesn’t use big words and curse a lot

[Beth · Rating 2 out of 5]

It's an interesting enough story but I agree with most other reviews here that it is highly unlikely to be true. I don't know about the climbing parts, but he claims a female bear is following him but the sizes he gives for it would put it at a trophy size male. A quick Google search shows female average 300-400 lbs and males 400-800 with the larger coastal ones averaging 900 lbs. Total average length for both genders is around 6.5 ft. This guy claims his female bear was 1200 lbs and 10 feet tall... Plus, yes a bear will defend her cubs at all costs when they are in danger, but follow for days for revenge way out of her usual habitat? Sounds doubtful to me

[Ann · Rating 2 out of 5]

ok

[Christopher Brown · Rating 2 out of 5]

The guy was not a great writer and after he killed the cub, I couldn't help but root for the bear. Additionally, it seems so contrived.

[Alex Heasman · Rating 5 out of 5]

Incredible story of survival.

[Liz Logan · Rating 2 out of 5]

Popsugar 2017: a genre I don't normally read (Sports, mountaineering)

The story was interesting but even if it was true (which the author says it was) it is too far-fetched to feel believable.

It is believable that the author killed a bear cub accidentally. The idea that the mother didn't come running when the baby screamed or was not around is not.

Do animals take revenge? Perhaps. However this animal did more than that. This animal went through elaborate planning to go after the author which is unlikely. One of the reasons animals are separate from humans is our ability to plan - an animal might plan to catch its food and an animal might look for a specific food type (i.e. Salmon for a bear), but it is unlikely a bear will look for a specific member of a specific food group.

Yet, that leads back to the question of animal revenge. As a pet owner, I can tell when my pets do things on purpose. However, when I squirt my cat with water she does not then destroy something. Maybe she doesn't sleep with me in the evening but she gets over it and does the same thing the next day.

I guess I'm saying all this to get to the point that the book was unable to be believable enough for me to suspend disbelief and enjoy it like I thought I would from its description.

[Hayden Markowski · Rating 1 out of 5]

Hayden Markowski
12/8/11
Word count: 318
Hunted


Hunted written by David Fletcher describes the chilling story of a fierce battle between man and beast. With a backdrop of the Alaskan mountains, this book hints at the perfect setting for an amazing story of survival and inner strength that is tested time and time again. After a bear cub is mistakenly killed the mother takes it’s revenge and goes after David. While David struggles in this fierce battle of life and death, he feels that even though a raging bear is tracking his every step he must reach the summit of the mountain he has waited his whole life to climb.

I would not recommend this book for a few specific reasons. To start, this book was very hard to connect with and get in to. The book doesn’t have a lot of description to tell a story that should have been written to paint a mental picture on every page. Even though I thought this book would have me never wanting to put the book down, I happened to be able to put the book down rather easily. With its poor descriptions and long drawn out chapters, it is in my view a poorly written book. When I read the book jacket I was anticipating a great adventure, but in reality, I found the book quite boring. It was so boring that I might not have finished it if it wasn’t for a grade. The plot of the story has the potential to bring the reader in, but the lack of description and poor details left me wanting more.

In summary I picked up this book anticipating a great adventure but what I got instead is a long story that forced me to use my imagination to put myself in the setting of what could have been, had it been told better, a really great adventure story.

[Nicholas · Rating 4 out of 5]

Nicholas Burda
5/31/16
Period 2nd
Book Review
Book Review
In the book “The Hunted” David Fletcher is a mountain man who spends his time in many different mountain ranges. He now lives in Kingston-Upon-Hull with his family. One of the mountains he has explored is the Hayes Mountains in Alaska which is the one of the largest mountain in the United States area. He was the only one that went on the trip leaving his family behind. He soon realizes that he is being hunted down by a 10 foot 1200 pound grizzly bear. The reason why he is being hunted is because he panicked and in the moment killed one of the cubs that were between him and the mom. David tries everything to escape and every night has nightmares about the bear getting him. He finally just let’s thought get to his mind and knowing that the momma bear is going to kill him and eat him alive. He surprisingly out runs this bears for weeks and makes it back home to his loving family and friends where now he tells them what fun of an adventure it was.
I really enjoyed this book and liked how much action and adventure was in it. I also liked it very much because it was actual real life and this guy experienced it and talked about it. I would recommend anyone that likes an action packed book and likes the outdoors. It is very convincing because it was in the eyes of a person that experienced a near death situation. The writing was very professional but also an easy read for anyone in high school or older. The only thing that he maybe could have done to make it a little bit better is talk about what happened after he went home. Or if he went back out there or stopped going to adventure the mother land. But all in all is was a very well written book and if I could read it again later on I definitely would.

[Mike · Rating 3 out of 5]

No question, this is an epic tale. The story itself easily deserves 5 stars. The only problem I have is the execution of it.

I expected it to entail more action, and involve the bear significantly more, but ultimately the bear took up less than 1/5th of the book, so the book jacket is rather misleading. There's intense scenes, don't get me wrong, but it's continuously broken up by 40 pages of Mr. Fletcher going into detail about glaciers and positioning his rope at the right angle to climb some cliff. Overall he goes into way too much detail about what sort of tools he uses for the specific climb he's doing. He goes through his climbing process too much, and unless your interested in climbing, it bores the shit out of you. I just want to see him get from pt A to pt B without the tedious details.

And the mountain terminology would put to sleep even the most determined reader. If your not a relatively experienced climber, you'll have no idea what karabiners, bivoucs, cairns, and crampons are (to name a few). Fortunately, at the end of the book there's a glossary of terms which helps.

After reading this I have much respect for Mr. Fletcher and what he went through. If I had gone through this experience (which is something I would never do) I wouldn't have lasted the first 80 pages. But one thing I definitely took away from the book is being so grateful for the life I have. I'm not stuck in some glacier fending off an angry bear bent on killing me, or stuck in some crevasse in below zero temperatures. I'm going to think twice next time I complain when I stub my toe

[Darius Nabors. · Rating 1 out of 5]

Someone wrote that they were rooting for the bear. I was as well. This guy sounds like a totally unprepared and egotistical nature hater. He kills the cub with his climbing equipment and then puts up a warning that there is an angry and evil bear on the other side of the ridge. I suppose he wouldn't be angry or upset if someone murdered his only child. He hardly packs enough food and is completely inept at painting a picture of where he is. I'll save you the trouble. He kills the cub, he climbs the mountain, he nearly eats candles, he feels more remorse for nearly eating candles, he kills the bear, he survives. End of story

[Neil Cameron · Rating 1 out of 5]

Hunted is terrible, a badly written cimbing story with the bear added to dress it up, Its write up and the story line sounded like a great read, but I found it so far fetched it was far from enjoyable.

Even with my basic climbing knowledge I could pick holes right through this story, which is claimed to be true, Can you imagine an experienced climber making camp inside a crevasse on an unstable glacier, right after a section of this glacier as the writter puts it "suddenly explodes" just missing him. need I add more, it must be very very roughly based on a true story.

[Ttg · Rating 4 out of 5]

Some of the reviewers were unimpressed. I gotta say of all the “survivor” tales I’ve read, this definitely kept my attention. I was on a long flight from the east coast to AK no less, and had time to read the entire book. Never a dull moment - Fletcher kept the paranoia building to the end. We actually passed the mountains depicted in this story along the Richardson Hwy en route to Valdez. The actual visual was not only awesome but after reading this book on the flight there, haunting as well! Well written and worth the read.

[Tim Painter · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is one incredible tale, mostly because it is true or at least the author says it is.

A man sets off into the Alaskan wild by himself to climb a mountain. He stumbles upon a bear cub who is alone and ends up killing the cub to save himself. The mother bear then comes after him with a vengeance. I won't give away the ending, the story is incredible though, better than fiction.

[Maria · Rating 4 out of 5]

Ture story of a bear who hunts a man after killing her cub, keeps you on the tip of your seat but not for everyone.

[Pat · Rating 3 out of 5]

a bear hunting human prey..what a twist and true!

[Travis · Rating 2 out of 5]

Personally, I was rooting for the bear.

[Glen D · Rating 1 out of 5]

It's an easy book to skim, a much harder one to accept as genuine.

[Matthew Tate · Rating 3 out of 5]

decent. I would recommend that the readers check out the glossary in the back of the book containing the mountain climber vocab.