Customer Reviews

The Blue Wolf: A Novel of the Life of Chinggis Khan (Weatherhead Books on Asia)

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This book is based on the life of the Khan as portrayed in "The Secret History of the Mongols" and the Meng-gu Yuan Liu, or "Origins of the Mongols". The author, who passed away in 1991 (so no sequels) also used a number of Japanese sources which I am unfamiliar with. Also in obvious use is the Altan Tobci which describes many traditional Mongolian customs, so there is considerable authenticity throughout the story.

If you care nothing for history and are looking for a page turner, I suggest the Conn Iggulden series (of which I am not a big fan because his historical ignorance is glaringly obvious) instead of the Blue Wolf, which sacrifices mass appeal for authenticity. In The Blue Wolf you will find the rather poetic dialog present in The Secret History, and this is essentially a fleshed out fictional version of the "original" work. As such, I found the character development a little lacking. I also have trouble cramming the Khan's whole life into a mere 275-pages, which even in the best of circumstances could hardly do it justice.

From his difficult childhood to his rise to Mongolian supremacy to the ambitious invasion of the States of Jin and Xixia, and the campaigns against the Khorazm empire, The Blue Wolf stays true to recounting the accepted historical record. Some events are covered a little too briefly, while other interesting details like the involvement of the mysterious Khitan Prince Yelu Chucai who advised the Khan and his successor Ogedei are aptly included (for a detailed account of Yelu Chucai check out the theoretically ambitious book, "The Mystery of Genghis Khan"). The Blue Wolf is full of excellent descriptions of the land (though accounts differ here as place names are inconsistent among the various sources) and the ancestral lineages of the Mongols and some of their neighbors.

I personally enjoyed The Blue Wolf, but I can also appreciate that it will primarily appeal more to aficionados of Mongol History than people new to the subject who are looking for exciting historical fiction that is more geared toward our contemporary audience.