Book excerpt: At a time when volcanoes were being born in what is now New Mexico, clans of hunter-gatherers were already living in the Great Plains. Primordial beasts roamed the land: creatures like the giant sloth, the flat-faced bear, the woolly mammoth, and the dire wolf hunted there, often coming into conflict with their two-legged prey. When Do-na-ti reaches adulthood, he slays the badger for his ceremonial cloak. By wedding E-lo-ni, he unites their clans. Together they must face battle with dire wolves, a stampede of mammoths that destroys their lodge, and the birth of a new volcano, fulfilling an old woman's prophecy and Do-na-ti's conviction that his son must become brother to the mountain. "Mayhar has a way of drawing the reader seamlessly into her historical narratives. You can smell the breath of the dire wolf as it closes in for the kill!" -- Robert Reginald