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Summary
Summary
Two tiger cub brothers are torn from the jungle and taken to Rome. The stronger cub is trained as a killer at the Coliseum. Emperor Caesar makes a gift of the smaller cub to his beautiful daughter, Aurelia. Boots is pampered while his brother, known as Brute, lives in the cold and darkness, let out only to kill. Caesar trusts Julius to watch Aurelia and her prized pet. But when a prank backfires, Boots temporarily escapes and Julius must pay with his life.
Summary
Two tiger cub brothers are torn from the jungle and taken to Rome. The stronger cub is trained as a killer at the Coliseum. Emperor Caesar makes a gift of the smaller cub to his beautiful daughter, Aurelia. She adores her cub, Boots. Julius, a young animal keeper, teaches Aurelia how to earn Boots's trust. Boots is pampered while his brother, known as Brute, lives in the cold and darkness, let out only to kill. Caesar trusts Julius to watch Aurelia and her prized pet. But when a prank backfires, Boots temporarily escapes and Julius must pay with his life. Thousands watch as Julius is sent unarmed into the arena to face the killer Brute.
"From the Hardcover edition."
Author Notes
Lynne Reid Banks was born in London, England on July I929. After studying at the Royal Academy of Dramatic Art, she acted and wrote for the repertory stage.Eventually, she turned to journalism, becoming one of Britain's first female television news reporters. Banks was fired from her job as a reporter, and while working a different job, she wrote her first novel, which went on to become a best seller.
Reviews (5)
Publisher's Weekly Review
"She felt dimly that the true power was to withhold the death stroke, to let the creature go when you could have killed it." This observation by Aurelia, Caesar's daughter, aptly summarizes the central theme of Banks's (The Indian in the Cupboard) gripping, tantalizing examination of power, sacrifice and mercy. At the novel's start, two brother tiger cubs are taken from their native land and brought to ancient Rome. The older, larger one becomes a celebrated killer in the circuses held at the Colosseum, while the younger becomes the pampered and adored pet of Aurelia, who names him Boots. Aurelia's warm feelings soon extend to the cub's keeper as well, a handsome young slave named Julius. But even the novel's most idyllic scenes, set in the sheltered luxury of the Emperor's palace, are infused with a nearly unbearable slow-boiling sense of anxiety, thanks to the ominous shadow of the brutal circus. When Aurelia's weak and selfish cousin Marcus devises a prank to play on Julius and Boots, he sets into motion a series of events that forever changes the lives of the three youngsters and the tiger brothers. Thrilling in its compassion and tinged with bittersweetness, the novel's conclusion leaves plenty of questions enticingly unanswered, providing ample material for thoughtful readers to ponder. Ages 12-up. (June) (c) Copyright PWxyz, LLC. All rights reserved
Horn Book Review
(Intermediate, Middle School) Two captured tiger cubs, brothers, have very different fates: Boots becomes the tame companion to Aurelia, the Roman emperor's daughter; Brute becomes the new attraction in the circuses, savaging and killing slaves and convicts and Christians. Boots, Aurelia, and Boots's keeper Julius become frequent companions -- Julius helps Aurelia through her horrific first visit to the circus -- but Julius knows that, as a slave, his romantic feelings for the emperor's daughter could endanger his life. When a prank thought up by Aurelia's jealous cousin results in Boots's escape, Julius is condemned to death in the circus for his negligence, and Aurelia is frantic. The Roman setting is authentically and convincingly portrayed, including the plight of the martyred Christians, and Banks ably captures the delicate balance between Aurelia's great power as the emperor's daughter and her knowledge that absolute power is a blunt instrument -- there are limits to what she can do. Passages from the tigers' perspective are occasionally and unnecessarily interposed, but on the whole this window into ancient Rome vibrates with life and with the tension of its gripping conclusion. (c) Copyright 2010. The Horn Book, Inc., a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted. All rights reserved.
Booklist Review
Gr. 5-8. Captured in the wild, two tiger cubs are shipped to Rome. There, the larger cat is raised to attack and kill people in the Colosseum, while the other is defanged and given to the caesar's daughter, Aurelia, as a pet. Although in the end the tigers meet again, the main story follows Aurelia, who is 12 when the story begins. Aurelia is a thoughtful, rather solitary child who loves her tiger, Boots, and, even more dangerously, comes to love his trainer as well. With her younger cousin, Marcus, she joins in a game that seems innocent at the time, but has perilous consequences for them all. Banks writes well, bringing the late-third-century Roman Empire to life in a novel that blends history with timeless human emotions. In swift, sure strokes, she effectively portrays Aurelia's discomfort, uncertainty, and growing confidence as she grows from child to adult, while using the tigers effectively as both characters and plot devices. --Carolyn Phelan Copyright 2005 Booklist
School Library Journal Review
Gr 5-7-Despite its mundane title, Banks's novel succeeds fairly well at being exotic and original. Two tiger cubs are captured and brought to ancient Rome. Brute is trained to be an aggressive killer of slaves, criminals, and Christians in the Colosseum; Boots is gentled into a pet for Caesar's beautiful 12-year-old daughter, Aurelia, and cared for by the slave Julius, who loves Aurelia from afar. When a prank goes awry and Julius is wrongly blamed for Boots's escape, Aurelia must decide where her loyalties lie. A vibrant setting and strong sense of place bring this often-neglected time period to life. Aurelia and Julius are three-dimensional, though the other characters (including the big cats themselves) are less believable and vivid. The conflict between the Roman pantheon of gods and Christianity lacks clear delineation and comes across as superficial. While not an essential purchase, this provocative title will appeal to fans of historical fiction, romance, and animal stories.-Melissa Moore, Union University Library, Jackson, TN (c) Copyright 2010. Library Journals LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.
Kirkus Review
A melodramatic foray into an extremely fictional ancient Rome. Twelve-year-old Aurelia is the daughter of Caesar, ruler of Rome around the third century. He presents her with a tiger cub, defanged and with claws trimmed, and Julius, the slave who trains and cares for him. She doesn't know that the cub has a littermate, kept bullied and hungry for the games at the Colosseum. Although the details of Roman life seem to be historically accurate, the tone is completely wrong. The animals are anthropomorphized to a fare-thee-well (think the recent movie novelization Two Brothers); Aurelia's distaste for the bloodshed of the games, both animal and human, and her interest in the persecuted Christians seem forced; and the actions of the slave Julius, who loves Aurelia, are simply not believable for that place and time. The climax finds Julius facing both the tame and wild tiger brothers in the Colosseum--and everyone lives. A much better journey into this era would be Caroline Lawrence's Roman Mysteries series. (Historical fiction. 10-14) Copyright ©Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.
Excerpts
Excerpts
ONE In the Hold The two cubs huddled together, their front paws intertwined, their heads and flanks pressed to each other. Darkness crushed them, and bad smells, and motion. And fear. The darkness was total. It was not what they were used to. In the jungle there is always light for a tiger's eyes. It filters down through the thickest leaves from a generous sky that is never completely dark. It reflects off pools and glossy leaves and the eyes of other creatures. Darkness in the jungle is a reassurance. It says it's time to come out of the lair, to play, to eat, to learn the night. It's a safe darkness, a familiar, right darkness. This darkness was all wrong. The smells were bad because there was no way to bury their scat. And there was the smell of other animals, and their fear. And there was a strange smell they didn't recognize, a salt smell like blood. But it wasn't blood. It was bad being enclosed. All the smells that should have dissipated on the wind were held in, close. Cloying the sensitive nostrils. Choking the breath. Confusing and deceiving, so that the real smells, the smells that mattered, couldn't be found, however often the cubs put up their heads and reached for them, sniffing in the foul darkness. The motion was the worst. The ground under them was not safe and solid. It pitched and rocked. Sometimes it leaned so far that they slid helplessly until they came up against something like hard, cold, thin trees. These were too close together to let the cubs squeeze between them. Next moment the ground tipped the other way. The cubs slid though the stinking straw till they fell against the cold trees on the other side. When the unnatural motion grew really strong, the whole enclosure they were in slid and crashed against other hard things, frightening the cubs so that they snarled and panted and clawed at the hard nonearth under their pads, trying in vain to steady themselves. They would put back their heads and howl, and try to bite the cold thin things that stopped them being free. Then their slaver sometimes had blood in it. When the awful pitching and rolling stopped and they could once again huddle up close, their hearts stopped racing, and they could lick each other's faces for reassurance. They were missing their mother--their Big One. They waited for her return--she had always come back before. But she was gone forever. No more warm coat, no rough, comforting, cleansing tongue. No more good food, no big body to clamber on, no tail to chase, pretending it was prey. No more lessons. No more love and safety. All their natural behavior was held in abeyance. They no longer romped and played. There was no space and they had no spirit for it. Mostly they lay together and smelled each other's good smell through all the bad smells. As days and nights passed in this terrifying, sickening fashion, they forgot their mother, because only Now mattered for them. Now's bewilderment, fear, helplessness, and disgust. There was only one good time in all the long hours. They came to look forward to it, to know when it was coming. They began to recognize when the undifferentiated thudding overhead, where the sky ought to be, presaged the opening of a piece of that dead sky, and the descent from this hole of the two-legged male animals that brought them food. Then they would jump to their feet and mewl and snarl with excitement and eagerness. They would stretch their big paws through the narrow space between the cold trees and, when the food came near, try to hook it with their claws and draw it close more quickly. The food, raw meat on a long, flat piece of wood, would be shoved through a slot down near the ground, the meat--never quite enough to fill their stomachs--scraped off, and the wood withdrawn. Water came in a bowl through the same slot. They often fought over it and spilled it. They were nearly always thirsty. The male two-legs made indecipherable noises: "Eat up, boys! Eat and grow and get strong. You're going to need it, where you're going!" And then there would be a sound like a jackal's yelping and the two-legs would move off and feed the other creatures imprisoned in different parts of the darkness. Brown bears. Jackals. A group of monkeys, squabbling and chattering hysterically. There were wild dogs, barking incessantly and giving off a terrible stench of anger and fear. There were peacocks with huge rustling tails, that spoke in screeches. And somewhere quite far away, a she-elephant, with something fastened to her legs that made an unnatural clanking sound as she moved her great body from foot to foot in the creaking, shifting, never-ending dark. One night the dogs began to bite and tear at each other amid an outburst of snarling and shrieking sounds. The cubs were afraid and huddled down in the farthest corner of their prison. But they could hear the wild battles as one dog after another succumbed and was torn to pieces. The next time the sky opened, the two-legged animals found a scene of carnage, with only two dogs left alive. "There'll be trouble now," one muttered, as he dragged the remains out from a half-opening while others held the survivors off with pointed sticks. "I said they should have put 'em all in separate cages. They'll say we didn't feed 'em enough." "Better cut the corpses up and give the meat to the tigers. Dogs is one thing, but if we lose one of them cubs, we'll be dog meat ourselves." After that there was no shortage of food and the cubs spent most of the time when they weren't eating, sleeping off their huge meals. But their sleep was not peaceful. The cubs had no desire to fight or kill each other. They didn't know they were brothers, but each knew that the other was all he had. One was the firstborn and the larger. He was the leader. In the jungle, he had been fed first and most, and had led their games and pretend hunts. He was also the more intelligent of the two. He came to understand that it was no use howling and scratching at the ground and rubbing backward and forward with cheek and sides against the cold, close-together barriers, or trying to chew them to pieces. When his brother did these things, he would knock him down with his paw and lie on him to stop him. The younger one would submit. It was better, he found. His paws, throat, and teeth stopped being sore. He learned to save his energies. But the misery was still there. It only stopped while he ate, and when he curled up with his brother and they licked each other's faces, and slept. From the Hardcover edition. Excerpted from Tiger, Tiger by Lynne Reid Banks All rights reserved by the original copyright owners. Excerpts are provided for display purposes only and may not be reproduced, reprinted or distributed without the written permission of the publisher.