Bernie Hafeli

Until reading Bear Season I had not encountered the story of Woijtek the Bear that went to war, indeed it was only on finishing the book that it occurred to me that the story may not be entirely fictitious and with very little research so it proved.
I won't dwell on the legend of Woijtek as it's easy enough to find the details elsewhere yet it is the unconditional love of the bear for his human colleagues and their's for him which underpins Hafeli's tale.
Bear Season is a wonderful piece of storytelling, set initially in post war Detroit where the Polish war veteran and emigre Izzy has made home close to his widowed sister in law and her son Czeslaw.
Struggling for work, and for purpose, and having let the love of his life get away, Uncle Izzy is popular amongst his drinking peers although considered a little eccentric due to his tendency to speak of the legend of Woijtek.
Izzy and Czeslaw are close, and the point arrives when Izzy's itchy feet get the better of him and he sets off with Ceslaw in tow to see if the flame of lost love still burns and more adventurously to be reunited with Woijtek now resident in Edinburgh Zoo.
The book becomes a road trip (and sea trip) with hitched rides and interesting characters encountered and then working for sea passage across the Atlantic.
Although essentially a story about the relationship of one man and a bear, the reality is that there is an even stronger presence in the story whom we can never meet but which binds everything together and that is Czeslaw's father, Izzy's brother, killed in action during the war in Europe.
Beloved by everyone and the undoubted favourite of Woijtek, borne out by photographs which Czeslaw finds in his uncle's cupboard.
Czeslaw observes his Uncle closely, doting on his memories, and finds the lure of meeting Woijtek irresistible, and is good company for the old man.
Hafeli's book is beautifully understated and heartwarming, without ever becoming sentimental, the story simply rolls along as if effortlessly and yet so much emotion, so much experience, so much heartbreak lies within its pages. In the face of considerable adversity the ties that bind the family and that old bear are woven with the rarest of threads, unconditional love.
I was fortunate indeed to win Bear Season in a GoodReads Giveaway with gratitude to the author, and heartily recommend the book to readers of all ages.… (mehr)