Jan, the wolf protagonist
A novel by Gabriele Piermartini

The Underdog King

Against All Odds

The story of Jan, the wolf who lost everything and became king.

Read the excerptsMeet the characters
The book

The story of Jan and his pack is the story of human beings. It is simply an example of how men face loneliness in the midst of the crowd. They desire communion, they seek it with all their strength, yet they remain isolated, like solitary penguins in a desert of ice. There are no grand explanations for the problem. It is the ‘problem.’ A conflict between the desire to survive, which means killing, and the desire to live, which means loving. A kind of Jonathan Livingston Seagull who runs through the woods, fights with his own kind, kills his prey, and in the end dies, extinguishing the light of experience with him. It is the flower that buds, blooms, and, withered, returns to the earth.

Enter the world of Jan and his pack, and you will experience the hunt through different eyes, smell unfamiliar scents, and feel new emotions.

Run with them through the winter night: you will be cold, hungry, thirsty; you will feel the snow working its way between your toes, your breath freezing, your eyes dazzled by the white glare of the snow.

Follow them through the summer days: you will feel the pleasure of the sun, smell the intense perfume of the flowers, see the thousand colors of the woods.

Change your coat, step into the skin of a wolf, and you will see a planet you have never experienced before.


The characters

Jan’s pack

Jan, the wolf protagonist, close-up portrait

Jan

The protagonist

Luna, a pale-coated she-wolf, portrait

Luna

Absolute love

A grey wolf in a natural setting

Gray Wolf

The antagonist

All the characters

The valley

The four seasons of the valley

The valley in spring, meadows in bloomThe valley in summer, green and luminousThe valley in autumn, golden larches and mistThe valley in winter, snow and silence
Explore the valley

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