American Tiger

by Adam Skolnick

A motherless nine-year-old girl glances out her school bus window and notices a tiger licking its paws behind Target. Nobody else sees it and nobody believes her, not even her father, a local game warden, because it is well known that Bell Tern has an untamed imagination. But evidence mounts and with it, the possibility that Bell is telling the truth and a most unlikely predator could be prowling a seemingly placid suburb of Los Angeles.

Based on true events, rooted in the stunning Southern California landscape, and populated with vivid characters, American Tiger is about more than a frantic tiger hunt. It’s about a child’s quest for self-discovery, her stoic father’s struggle to come to terms with their past, and the innate wildness of every living thing.

Genres: Fiction

342 pages, Kindle Edition

Published December 2, 2025

Reviews

[Milena Gonzalez · Rating 5 out of 5]

Adam Skolnick artfully transforms an incident he covered 20 years ago while working for LA Weekly into a beautiful piece of fiction that delves into themes of loss, grief, and reconnecting with the wildness we all share. I was instantly captivated by this father–daughter story, with its lively characters and tasteful touches of magical realism. Skolnick has a talent for storytelling, a passion for wildlife, and a gift for turning a single incident into a resonant message. He is an unforgettable voice in eco-fiction.

[Ava · Rating 5 out of 5]

Adam Skolnick’s American Tiger prowls at the edge of belief, where truth and imagination blur into something quietly feral. It begins with a simple claim—a child sees a tiger behind a California Target—and grows into a meditation on how people tackle grief, nature, and the fragile art of paying attention.

Bell Tern, the young narrator at the story’s heart, is not a dreamer so much as an observer. Her drawings and stories are attempts to make sense of a world that rarely listens to children and even less to wonder. Her father, Jay, a weary game warden, embodies the opposite impulse: to measure, to verify, to control. The tension between them powers the book, even as it circles questions too large to answer: what do we owe the wild, and what part of ourselves must we lose to live among the tame?

Skolnick writes in crisp, sensory prose, each page steeped in the scent of sagebrush and dust. His California isn’t romantic; it’s exhausted and still beautiful, a place where housing tracts and hawks coexist uneasily. He treats both wilderness and suburbia with the same compassion, as if each were struggling to survive the other.

This novel isn’t chasing spectacle. It’s chasing truth—the kind that hides in stories people tell to stay whole. Readers looking for suspense will find quiet instead, but also wonder: the slow revelation that sometimes what seems impossible only asks for a different kind of seeing.

American Tiger is for those who love language that lingers and characters who search rather than arrive. It’s not merely a story about a tiger; it’s about the courage it takes to keep believing there might still be one out there.

Content Warning: Includes brief moments of peril involving animals and emotional themes of loss.

Note: I received an ARC of this book, but that does not impair the honesty and fairness of my writeup.

[C. Douglas · Rating 5 out of 5]

I've been a fan of Adam Skolnick's non-fiction work for years and was excited to read his debut novel. I was not disappointed. Adam weaves a beautiful and courageous story based on actual events that is fit for ages 9-99. Anyone who enjoys eco fiction, mystical realism, coming of age, or adventure genres will love this book!

[Jason Russack · Rating 5 out of 5]

Incredible work by Skolnick. I came across this from his mention of it on the Rich Roll Podcast, and I was not disappointed! A great commentary on humanity through the lens of nature.

I loved the subtle swim mask reference that any avid Roll On fan would pick up!

[Sydney G Hirsch · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is a beautiful story. Adam captures the characters and their emotions, beliefs, sense of morality, in a way that allow the reader to identify in a most intimate connection. His description of the mountains, flora ! Fauna and the tiger adds a sense of reality with regards to the setting.
Loved this book.
Looking forward to the next book.
SGH

[Casey Clark · Rating 5 out of 5]

Skolnick absolutely crushed this one. He mixed a real life story with spirituality, magical thinking, real life trauma, and shared experience, in the most elegant way. He took the reader on a ride through a common relationship with dad and daughter, navigating the realities of being motherless, and ended with a riveting chase.

My favorite quote:

When bad piled on top of bad, it was just as tempting for the afflicted to believe that the world was against them, that they were the playthings of the gods, or that they created the conditions that allowed their terrible luck to blossom, that they deserve it.

But….the fact was almost everything wonderful and horrible that had ever happened was mostly beyond your control. Nature at play.

Often, it’s how a particular beast reacts to the randomness of their life that determines how their story ends. It was not anticipation of good or bad news, but acceptance that either would come at any time and the willingness to stay ready on all fronts.

[celeste brash · Rating 5 out of 5]

What a dreamy read! This book is the perfect blend of a magical escape and can't-put-it-down pacing. It's like a warm cup of cocoa for the soul, bringing the reader into the world of a nine-year-old girl and an escaped tiger while remaining relevant and grounded in the real, adult world. I love the journalistic writing style that makes it feel like you're reading an engaging write-up of a true story, which makes the light sprinkling of the fantastic feel more real and go straight to the heart. This story feels made for the big screen. It's the type of uplifting tale (tail?) we all need right now.

[Matt Watson · Rating 4 out of 5]

The writer takes a non fictionalized event (escaped Tiger in LA) and weaves a touching tale of a relationship between and father and daughter.

There are enough interesting sub characters and drama involved in the story to make it a real page turner.

I did find the character of Krull to be a bit formulaic, but that is a minor critique.

The novel does not end how i had anticipated and i really enjoyed where the author takes the story.

There are some very touching moments in the book, but do not wish to spoil anything for further readers.

Overall an enjoyable read and i look forward more from
this author.

[Stephanie Rose · Rating 5 out of 5]

Captivating!

The characters became my nighttime reading companions. This fictionalized, moving account of a young girls search for her truth offers hope that we can all overcome and heal from traumas we don’t understand and find new ways of moving through our world. Thanks Adam for a great adventure! Can’t wait for your next novel!

[Lynda Huffman · Rating 4 out of 5]

Based on a true story of an escaped tiger in California in 2005, this follows the story of a fictional Wildlife officer and his 9 year old daughter Bell, who first spotted the tiger. You not only learn a lot about nature, tracking, and tiger behavior, but human behavior too. The interior lives of the characters, including Bolt the tiger, are richly drawn, and you’ll find yourself cheering for all three of them. After reading this, I found a newspaper article relating the real life events, and the owners of the escaped tiger and her treatment are accurately depicted.

[Mandy MacLean · Rating 4 out of 5]

Really enjoyed this book! 👌 a great debut novel. Loved that the story was created and based around a real event. Also Loved the different story lines woven in. Just a single dad and his daughter trying to do what's right by nature and its animals.

[Jennifer Chiu · Rating 4 out of 5]

I loved this novel. It’s about family - a father and a daughter. The daughter is nine years old and on a quest to learn her origin story. A tiger is involved, along with many other animals that populate the pages.

[Brenna Lyles · Rating 5 out of 5]

I’m a huge fan of Adam and Rich Roll’s Roll On podcast and when I listened to the episode where Adam described this book, I knew I needed to pick it up. So glad I did. What a beautiful telling of a father and daughter’s bond and shared heartbreak. The descriptive scenery of Ventura County and northern LA also made me nostalgic for my SoCal upbringing. I burned through this novel and hope there’s more fiction to come from Adam.

[Luke Howard · Rating 5 out of 5]

This was one of my favorite reads in a while! I have always enjoyed listening to Adam on the Rich Roll podcast and have kept an eye on his work for a while. Hoping to see more fiction from him in the future!

[Stephen Hallett · Rating 5 out of 5]

​American Tiger is truly a marvelous, first-class novel... Author Adam Skolnick takes us on a compelling journey... a journey that elegantly reminds us there is hard-fought beauty in this world.

[Elena · Rating 5 out of 5]

beautiful story about nature and nurture and humans in it

Loved a story of a tiger and a girl finding their freedom and true selves. What a beautiful connection!
This novel clearly shows Adam’s love for nature and his home. It felt like i spent a week in California.
This book intertwined a bit with my life, also, like a sign.

[April · Rating 5 out of 5]

As a wildlife lover who is drawn to animal fiction like Remarkably Bright Creatures and Horse, American Tiger hit all the right places.

In this magical piece of storytelling based on true events in 2005, Adam takes us on a search for a tiger through such detailed prose of the spectacular Southern California landscape, while subtly expanding on the wild interconnectedness of all things.

[Whitner Kincaid · Rating 5 out of 5]

Timeless Storytelling

Loved the storytelling that made me feel like I was a part of it all. Thank you for weaving in the timeless and inspirational messages.

[Wendy Cicek · Rating 5 out of 5]

Absolutely loved this book by Adam Skolnick, who I have followed for years after hearing him banter with Rich Roll on the Rich Roll podcast. I love Adam’s perspectives on multiple issues and was very excited to read his book. This book did not disappoint. I am an animal lover, and the relationships between human and animal relationships were beautiful. The character development was great and I fell in love with Bell, the motherless nine-year-old girl who is so wise for her young years. I must admit, I was cheering for the tiger the whole time. Hope this is not his last book!

[Greg Williams · Rating 4 out of 5]

A young girl in California spots a tiger while on the way home from school. But no one else sees it. No one believes her, including her father who is a game warden. She continues to search by herself until eventually others realize that there is a big cat loose in the area.

I learned some things about big cats and game wardens and ecosystems as I read this book. But the book is really about the relationship between a daughter and her father. This is well-written and it kept me engaged throughout. I liked it.

[Courtney Bell · Rating 5 out of 5]

I loved it! Great story. Compelling and well written. Thank you the adventure!

[Jamie · Rating 5 out of 5]

Such a great book

[Phil · Rating 5 out of 5]

Flat out awesome novel

A fun and fantastic story, well told by a first time novelist.
I first encountered Adam Skolnick when I read One Breath, a fascinating and tragic true story.
I highly recommend both -even though they are very different types of books

[Book Reviewer · Rating 5 out of 5]

American Tiger follows nine-year-old Bell Tern, a sharp and wildly imaginative kid who becomes the first person in quiet Alisaw Valley to spot a tiger wandering near a Target loading dock. No one believes her, not even her father Jay, a game warden who knows there should be no tigers in Ventura County. As more strange sightings ripple across the valley, the story blends tension, family struggle, and ecological wonder. The tiger becomes a spark that exposes fear, disbelief, and a father and daughter’s effort to bridge the widening gap between their inner worlds. The opening chapters paint Bell’s devotion to drawing and documenting wildlife, her loneliness at school, and Jay’s steady but fraying attempts to raise her while holding the wild at bay.

This book pulled me in fast. I felt a kind of fond ache watching Bell try to prove what she saw. Her imagination is so alive that you can’t help rooting for her, even when it gets her labeled as a liar. The writing hits a sweet spot. It’s warm, direct, and paced in a way that made me forget I was reading. I liked how the author paints the valley around them. The details are simple but vivid. The land feels baked into the bones of the characters. I also noticed how naturally humor and sadness sit together in the scenes. One minute I was smiling at Bell’s oddball survival kit in her backpack. The next I felt a sharp little twist in my chest as the bus full of kids turns on her when she reports the tiger.

I also found myself moved by the relationship between Bell and Jay. Their dynamic is messy in a relatable way that I appreciated. Jay tries so hard to be steady and rational, but he’s worn down. The moment he gets a report of “a striped tail” under a pepper tree, something shifts in him, and I felt it. The writing lets him be flawed without judgment, and that made me care even more. The stakes get bigger as the search spreads. Experts arrive, each with their own trauma or agenda, and everything grows more tangled. I liked that the book never leans into cheap danger. Instead, it digs into fear, memory, loss, and what wildness means in a world that keeps shrinking.

The story touched that soft place where wonder and grief live side by side. I kept thinking about how a giant animal roaming the suburbs could expose so much about the humans who live there. The book surprised me. The writing has heart. It’s clear and calm on the surface, but there’s a current running underneath it that pulled me along.

I’d recommend American Tiger to readers who enjoy character-driven stories with a strong sense of place. It’s great for people who love literary fiction that carries a hint of adventure and for anyone drawn to stories about family, nature, and the things we try to believe in. It would also hit home for readers who like books told through the eyes of kids who see the world in ways adults forget.

[Reader · Rating 5 out of 5]

A beautiful, quietly powerful story. American Tiger follows Jay, a California game warden, and his nine-year-old daughter Bell, who spots an escaped tiger behind a Target—and can't get anyone, including her father, to believe her. Bell has a reputation for her big imagination—she's always sketching evidence of things she's seen that couldn't possibly be real. So when she insists there's a tiger loose in Alisaw Valley, he figures it's just another one of her episodes.

What unfolds is a story about belief, loss, and coming to terms with the past. Jay and Bell are both carrying grief they don't talk about directly, and Adam lets you feel the shape of it through what's left unsaid. But he weaves in something deeper too: grief that belongs to every living thing, and a sense of our connectedness to the wildness we're slowly training ourselves to ignore.

The book is inspired by a real tiger escape near Simi Valley in 2005. Adam covered it as a young reporter, spent time with the game wardens searching for the animal, and you can feel that grounding in every detail. The writing is captivating—sensory, assured, and deceptively effortless, with warmth and quiet humor throughout.

He builds his world through the details, and knows when to hold back—the Southern California setting comes through: the Santa Susanas, sagebrush and manzanita, subdivisions slowly eating into ranchland. He takes you inside the wildlife navigating that landscape too—their instincts, their losses, their unlikely bonds. Those moments stayed with me.

The writing and themes are approachable for all ages. I received an advance copy and can't recommend it enough.

[Barclay Dunn · Rating 4 out of 5]

I read this in a day! I liked it a LOT. I thought the protagonist, 9-year-old Bell, was sympathetic and relatable.

Bell grew up from age 3 without a mother, and her father does the best he can but is often pulled away by his engrossing job as a game warden in northern California. Bell is rebellious against the outside world, including her "stupid" classmates at school, and focuses her intelligence on the natural world and on her artistic activities. When she sees a tiger behind the Target from the bus window, naturally nobody believes her, even her dad, so she has to take matters into her own hands. What ensues is engaging, heart warming, a tiny bit predictable, but really very satisfying in the end. Other characters, like her dad, her dad's naturalist boss Miriam, her dad's game warden boss, and the new-ish and slightly scary school principal, a world-famous tiger hunter, and even the lead bully in Bell's class, are rendered pretty carefully and in three dimensions. Some of the slack in Bell's care is taken up by Miriam and the principal and she gets mothering that is helpful. The story of the tiger is also handled lovingly and carefully. I don't want to spoil the ending but it's also mostly gratifying.

I'd feel comfortable letting a kid age 9 or older read this book, but as an adult I liked it too.

[Katherine Crawford · Rating 2 out of 5]

I wanted to love American Tiger because the premise promised an emotional story about grief, family, and healing. There are certainly moments of beauty, and the author’s descriptions of the natural surroundings are vivid and atmospheric. Readers who enjoy immersive settings and a slower pace may appreciate these aspects.

However, I found that the balance between setting and story didn’t quite work for me. Much of the narrative seemed devoted to describing the environment, while the characters themselves remained underdeveloped. I struggled to form a strong connection with them, and their emotional journeys often felt more implied than fully explored.

As a result, the book moved at a very slow pace and, unfortunately, began to feel repetitive. Rather than being carried along by the plot, I found myself working through chapters without much anticipation for what came next. What should have been a moving and compelling story ended up feeling more like a chore than an enjoyable reading experience.

There is a heartfelt story at the centre of the novel, and I can understand why some readers connected deeply with it. For me, though, the pacing and lack of stronger character development prevented it from reaching its full potential.

[Kendall · Rating 5 out of 5]

I have lived in Los Angeles for 10 years and have loved Los Angeles for 10 years. And for 10 years, I have listened to a very loud camp of people who say LA sucks. This book is proof of LA's beauty. Adam Skolnick captures the layers of the greater Los Angeles area from the way light reflects off of hot concrete to the pockets of nature that spring up in its shadows. And the city is just one of the "background" characters. Not only did I feel a swelling love for Southern California, I fell in love with Jay and Bell and lived in the warm fuzzy bubble that is a father and daughter desperately trying to do right by one another. For all the LA lovers and haters, I promise this book was written just for you.

[Samantha · Rating 5 out of 5]

I just finished American Tiger, and it's easily a 10/10 for me. This book does such an incredible job weaving together multiple storylines in a way that feels both seamless and deeply engaging. Every thread adds something meaningful, and the payoff is absolutely worth it.
What really stood out to me were the characters
-especially Bolt and Bell. They felt so real and easy to connect with, and I found myself completely invested in their journeys. By the end, I genuinely didn't want the story to end.
If you're looking for a book that pulls you in emotionally and keeps you hooked all the way through, I can't recommend this one enough.

[Sylvia Fierro · Rating 5 out of 5]

American Tiger is a beautifully crafted story that is equal parts adventure, mystery, and love letter to Southern California. I was quickly enveloped by the characters and the brave little protagonist who had my allegiance from the start. American Tiger is at times heart wrenching as traumatic pasts are revealed whilst being driven towards the crescendo through sheer adrenaline and anticipation. To learn it’s based on a true story added to the suspense-What a fun ride from start to finish!!