Review: The Plains of Passage - Jean M. Auel

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The fourth novel in Jean M. Auel's magnificent epic of life on the glacial continent of the last Ice Age, when two kinds of human beings, Neanderthal and Cro-Magnon, shared the earth.

Ayla the orphan and Jondalar the traveller leave the safety of the land of mammoth hunters by the Black sea and embark on a seemingly impossible journey across the whole of a continent.  Their goal is the Cro-Magnon settlement in what is now southern France from which Jondalar set out years before as a young man.

Accompanied by the half-tame Wolf, the superb stallion Racer and the mare Whinney, they brave both savage enemies and the elemental dangers of weather and terrain in their search for the place that will become Home.

Earth's Children Series:
The Clan of the Cave Bear
The Valley of Horses
The Mammoth Hunters
The Plains of Passage
The Shelters of Stone
The Land of Painted Caves

Visit Jean M. Auel's Website for more information.

Review:
In The Plains of Passage we follow Ayla and Jondalar on their epic journey to the home Jondalar left 5 years ago.  He wants to return to his people and share the discoveries he has made and Ayla just wants to find a home where she can settle down and start a family.  The journey isn't going to be an easy one and they will face various dangers on the way but can they make it across the glacier before spring causes the ice to start melting?

I have to admit that this is my least favorite book in the series, my copy has 975 pages which makes it an incredibly long read and now that I'm on my 5th read through of the series I confess I did skim read through quite a few of the descriptive passages.  Jean Auel is able to write fantastic detailed descriptions of the landscape and its plant and animal life but although there are some new things to be learnt in this installment quite a lot of page time is devoted to things we already found out in earlier books.  The main part I was really interested in (the part of the journey where they are crossing the glacier) was actually over quite quickly but I did find it really interesting reading.  Jean Auel obviously put a lot of thought into how they would get both themselves, and the animals they are travelling with, across safely.

Although the descriptions can be a bit much at times (I now know far more than I ever wanted or needed to about the mating patterns of mammoths for example!) and the numerous love scenes between Ayla and Jondalar have become tiresome what I really enjoyed was their interactions with the groups of people they meet along the way.  They make stops at several of the camps that Jondalar and Thonolan visited on their earlier journey and it was nice to see what has been happening with them since we saw them last, the Sharamudoi in particular.  We also get to meet several new groups of people and I was pleased that in this installment Ayla isn't the only person who invents every new discovery.  She is still a little too perfect, managing to solve problems everywhere she goes, but I can't help really liking her!

I would have enjoyed the book more if it had been trimmed down a bit but I would still recommend this for fans of the series.

Source: Purchased

Other Reviews:
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