The Tiger

Why it’s on the list: Vaillant’s account of a man-eating Amur tiger in the Russian Far East, and of the post-Soviet frontier economy of poaching and timber that put the animal and the men in the same forest.

Where I heard about it

• @moseskagan’s thread — named as “The Tiger” in the replies to his question “What historical fiction should I read next? (Bonus points for something involving building or trade, rather than violence)” in the thread, April 2025. The full list of replies lives on What historical fiction should I… (tweet).
• In Patrick O’Shaughnessy’s Full Reading List (Investor Field Guide, 2016) — the archive of his monthly book-club recommendations, saved by Kyle in April 2020 — Full Reading List (Investor Field Guide).

About this edition

The thread asked for historical fiction and this is non-fiction, so the identification is not certain. Vaillant’s 2010 book is by far the best-known title matching the bare reply.

Connections

• Russia — The Primorye territory where it is set.
• Frontier — The post-Soviet borderland economy the book describes.
• What historical fiction should I… (tweet) — the thread this recommendation came from.