Yes this book deals with some heavy topics, but it is so well done! The author takes a bear attack and turns it into page turning crime procedural mystery; she takes a life altering medical diagnosis and turns it into a meditative self-reflection on finding clarity in your life; and she doubles down on her love of nature and science.

This is an honest and eloquent memoir about the author’s experience with cancer skillfully intertwined with the mystery of a tragic true story that left two campers dead after an encounter with a bear. A thoroughly researched book that has equal appeal for readers who enjoy books about nature, mystery / thrillers, and facing adversities.

The author writes about her experience with such a reflective and open-minded approach that it left me feeling peacefully optimistic.

Received as a free ARC from NetGalley, with thanks to author and publisher
A great memoir from Claire Cameron! She describes the locations with evident affection, so much so that I could envision the similar locales from my youth. The interconnection of events she studied (the bear attack) and those she experienced both as a child (losing a parent) and as an adult (a cancer diagnosis) weave well in the backdrop of loving both the environment and her life. It was a poignant read, a great example of the power of nature in ways that we perceive as positive and negative. I appreciated the emphasis on acceptance of the unknown/unknowable in both the motivation of the bear and of the cancer(s).

3.5* This memoir was about grief, survival, true crime, and the beauty (and danger) of nature. Claire Cameron’s journey is deeply personal, and the audiobook made it feel even more intimate. Her reflections on loss and illness are powerful, but I found that story jumped around a lot, which made it hard for me to stay fully engaged. That said, some parts were fascinating, and if you love introspective memoirs with a mix of science and nature, it’s worth a listen!

Thank you to Netgalley and Penguin Random House Canada Audiobooks | Knopf Canada for the eARC of this book in exchange for my honest review.

Review was posted (Instagram, Goodreads, bookishlytara blog, Storygraph) on March 17, 2025. An additional post (with a reposted review) will be posted on Instagram on the publication day as well as an Amazon Canada review (currently pending). (links below)

“Will I survive a bear attack? I’d been asking the wrong question. Being alive is one big risk and it will end in death, but the bridge between those two things is love.”

This was a surprising book. It was offered to me as an ARC through NetGalley and the title grabbed me! This is a memoir by Claire Cameron who dealt with a cancer diagnosis by becoming obsessed with a 1991 couple that were killed by a black bear.

It wasn’t at all what I was expecting, but I did really enjoy it. The author took on a good view for the bear, he was not the enemy in this book, rather a creature just living its life. There is a focus on being cautious in the outdoors, and she provided great history about humans interactions with bears and how truly rare their attacks can be. The book plays with the theme of fear, how her fear of her cancer diagnosis and the known plays into her life, and how the fear of a potential bear attack, and how she is able to overcome come both.

I think this is a great book for anyone who is outdoorsy.

Thank you to NetGalley, Penguin Random House Canada, and Claire Cameron for the ARC of this book!

Sometimes its worth it to get outside of one's comfort zone. In this case its my listening headspace through an audiobook I may not have given a chance to under normal circumstances. I have to confess that I am not normally drawn to books like Claire Cameron's How To Survive A Bear Attack: A Memoir. I was unfamiliar with the author or her previous works so a memoir was not overly appealing. And then when I learned it involved her cancer journey I debated on giving it a pass because I am a cancer survivor and an admitted coward who is easily triggered.

But I do love Algonquin Park, nature and bears. And I have been feeling nostalgia for my birth home Toronto so I thought I will give this one a chance and I'm sure glad I did!

Claire Cameron is a bestselling author who comes from my home town Toronto. In her memoir she talks about her early life in our shared city and dealing with the death of her Dad from a very aggressive form of skin cancer. Algonquin Park another place I know very well plays a large role in her working through her loss and grief. But as beautiful and healing as Nature is it can also at times be dangerous.

The author takes us through her examination of a rare predatory bear attack and the death of two campers at a remote campsite in the park back in 1991. This investigation dovetails with her finding out that she has an aggressive cancer and genetic mutation that may cut her life tragically short. The two intertwine into a poignant reminder of the fragility of life, our need as stewards of this planet to respect and care for the wildlife we share it with and the enduring power of love.

The audiobook is narrated by the author and it was well worth my listening to it. Highly recommend.

Thank you to Penguin Random House Canada Audiobooks via Netgalley, for the opportunity to listen to an advance copy of this audiobook in exchange for an honest review.

https://www.goodreads.com/review/show/7436304377

https://susandemeter.blogspot.com/2025/03/abearattack.html

This was a very unique, interesting read. Not your typical memoir. I love how Cameron used the metaphor about surviving a bear attack as a parallel for life and her battle with cancer. The audiobook was a quick, enjoyable listen.

How to Survive a Bear Attack: A Memoir by Claire Cameron isn’t my typical read—but I’m so glad I picked it up. This memoir is a thoughtful, often gripping reflection on fear, survival, and our relationship with the wild. Cameron weaves together personal experience with a wide range of sources, creating a layered and insightful narrative that lingers long after the final chapter.

Thank you to Claire Cameron, Knopf Ca, and Netgalley for the ALC. How to Survive a Bear Attack releases on March 25, 2025—definitely one to watch for.

Bear attacks are incredibly rare. There are hundreds of thousands of bears in North America and only a handful of fatal attacks every year. However, when there is a fatal attack it becomes news that is not easy to forget. Claire Cameron became captivated by one such attack in Algonquin Park in 1991. She loosely based a fictional story on the attack (The Bear - a great book I read a while back) and now she has written a more personal story that discusses how that tragic event impacted her as she faced her own life-threatening event (a rare cancer diagnosis).

The weaving together of these very distinct, but related, events made for a very unique memoir. Both of these events are completely terrifying to me and so I found this to be a bit of a difficult read - that’s how vivid it was.

Thank you to NetGalley and Penguin Random House Canada for giving me the opportunity to listen to this audiobook!

First off, this story has such a reflective, relaxing, and interesting take on learning from experiences. I loved how Cameron told the story, as she narrates it herself. It provides awe and inspiration.

Secondly, I was not expecting to like this memoir as much as I did. It had this personal impact on me, where I was remembering my own adventures as a young kid wandering the woods with my parents, learning about the natural world.

Lastly, bears are such interesting creatures.

If you enjoy travelling into the mind of someone who takes their experiences and reflects upon them, who takes things face value, and uses that knowledge to grow stronger, this is the book for you.

This book reads like a combination memoir / true crime investigation into a deadly bear attack. The author has an amazing way of steering the narrative between seemingly unrelated topics while still telling a fascinating story and teaching us a lot of new things. I've spent years in the backcountry, including Algonquin Park and had several bear encounters and still learned a lot from this book. Claire really embraces the story from many different perspectives, including the bear's, and to hear the audiobook narrated in her own voice added even more impact.

This wasn't my usual choice but I enjoyed it. It gave a nice fresh perspective at the end on life. It really made me think for a while. Her take on life was so refreshing.

I can't usually listen to audiobooks but I found this one easy to listen to and to follow. I liked that it was the author who narrated it.

Thanks to Netgalley for this one!

In 1991 a couple was killed by a black bear in a rare predatory attack in Algonquin Park, Canada. Claire Cameron, the author, herself familiar with the park, became obsessed with the attack and researched the event while recovering from the same deadly skin cancer that killed her father.

This book wasn't what I was expecting at all but I liked it all the same. I visited Algonquin Park in the distant past and the closest I came to a bear was when park officials placed a large bear cage trap on a triangle of land in the campground. Luckily it remained empty but I was definitely not camping in the back country. This book contains a lot of information about bears and I especially enjoyed the parts of the story told from the bear's point of view. The author really got into his head. Her research into the couple's killing in 1991 was entwined with her own battle with cancer. I was sorry to hear what she's been through and wish her all the best for the future.

The audiobook was narrated by the author herself and she did a great job. I suspect that I would've found the print version less captivating. Such a lovely cover too.

Thank you to Penguin Random House Canada Audiobooks/Knopf Canada, via Netgalley, for the opportunity to listen to an advance copy of this audiobook. All opinions expressed are my own.
Publication Date: March 25, 2025

37. HOW TO SURVIVE A BEAR ATTACK (2025) by Claire Cameron (Audibook by author) … March 24 … novelist Claire Cameron melds the memories of her father’s death to rare melanoma, with her own cancer struggles and her love of both Beowulf and black bears…all while researching and attempting to solve the case of a 1991 doubly-fatal bear attack in Algonquin Park, Ontario. It’s a beautiful combination of memoir and historical fiction, with lessons on life and life thrown in for good measure. The book is outstanding but our author sadly didn’t hit a home run as a narrator. Still worth grabbing when it comes out later in March 2025. GRADE: A

Thank you to Netgalley and the publisher for providing me with an audiobook copy of this book in exchange for an honest review.

I really enjoyed this memoir and binged listening to it! I love when authors (especially of memoirs) are the narrators of their audiobooks.
As someone who grew up on the edge of the woods bears are something that I have thought a lot about so listening to this audiobook where we are provided history of bears and talks about their behaviour and their interactions with people was a treat. The topics and discussions that the author provides in this work (including the topic of cancer) are eloquently written and part of why I could not take my headphones out until it was done.

This is a book that I was recommend to so many people.

Thank you to Netgalley, Penguin Random House and The Bookshelf Guelph for copies of this novel. Here are my thoughts!

In this memoir, Claire Cameron, best known for her novel The Bear, dives into info behind wilderness and bears, as well as her own personal life and the battles she has to face.

I went into this one a little bit blind. I have The Bear on my shelf but haven’t read it yet (story of my life), but I felt very inspired by her background. So, when I received a copy of this book I was very excited to learn more about the author.

In high school, I volunteered at a zoo, and I got to explain some of the bear facts to kids. I also have a zoology degree, and I love bears so the subject material was spot on. She focuses a bear attack that happened in Algonquin in 1991. She does a fantastic job explaining the attacks from the people’s side but also from what the bear could have been thinking and reasoning. I have a pretty good bear knowledge, but I still learned a ton.

The author also opens up about her cancer diagnosis and her associated genetic condition. I wasn’t expecting this part of the novel, but I found my heart really went out to her. She described her diagnoses and it’s meaning very beautifully as well as the impact on her family.

Best of all, I mostly listened to this novel and Claire narrated it herself which feels so special. Because this novel is so personal it adds that much more meaning, and I loved listening to it!

Claire Cameron was only 9 years old when her father was diagnosed and later passed away from an aggressive form of skin cancer. She worked through her grief by immersing herself in nature and the wilderness to help her heal over the years. Later in life when she is also diagnosed with the same cancer that took her father and faced with the reality that she has to limit her UV exposure she becomes highly invested in a fatal black bear attack that happened in 1991 in Algonquin Provincial Park. Through her very thorough investigation we see how she relates different aspects of life, nature, and environment to the attack and why it happened.

I truly learned so much while listening to this book. I have grown up going to Algonquin Park and have always thought that black bears were mostly harmless. I obviously learned basic bear safety, and was under the impression black bear attacks mostly happen when the bear feels threatened(ie. a mother and her cubs. Hearing such a deep dive on this seemingly unprovoked attack that proved fatal was eye opening. Hearing different experts' opinions and also informed speculation as to what could have pushed the bear to do it was absolutely fascinating. Especially with the book being written in a way a true crime investigation would be. I think the author did a decent job relating it back to her melanoma diagnosis, and overall did a great job with the subject matter.

Part memoir, and part historically accurate re-telling of a fatal and horrific bear attack on two campers in 1991, this is a difficult book to read, both for its emotional content and its blood-curdling recounting of the most nightmarish encounter with wildlife this reader could ever imagine. Made all the more grisly by its terrible truth.

The author, a novelist, life-long outdoors enthusiast and a camping guide, has spent years exploring and enjoying the Canadian wilderness, and in particular, the spectacular lakes of Alconguin Park.

Extremely close to her father, an English Professor of some reknown, as a child her world was ripped apart by his sudden death of melanoma at the age of forty two. As the author’s life evolves, joy and adventure mingles with grief and fear, as an obsession with bears (and the story behind this particular attack) develops, and will run along in parallel.

Encyclopedic in her attention to detail, the authors insight into bears and their nature and habits makes for absolutely fascinating reading, an investigative obsession that becomes clearer to the reader as (no spoilers here) the author develops her own scary and potentially deadly medical history.

With incredible finesse, the authors dips and dives across themes, pulling the reader in across a journey that took my breath away in parts, and had me reaching for tissues in others. As the author grapples with issues including: learning to face the terrors of both what we know and what we can never know; the fear of death, the monster, that follows us all,in the shadows; our organic and shared primal wildness; and the threadedness of love, making it all, every last bit of it, resoundingly worthwhile.

All in all a terrific read, this book is hard to put down, and harder still to forget. I listened to the audiobook, and loved the intimacy and accessibility of the author as narrator — making for a truly immersive (and even more emotional) literary experience.

A great big thank you to Netgalley, the author, and the publisher for an ARC of this book. All thoughts provided are my own.

** four and a half shiny stars

Thank you to the publisher and NetGalley for an audio copy of How to Survive a Bear Attack by Claire Cameron (a Memoir)

I live just outside Toronto, Canada and have personal experience with places referenced. I have travelled yearly to Huntsville ON since 1998 in September to catch all the fall colours. My first visit to Algonquin Park was in 2005 just for a Day hike with my 4 year old and her father, in the fall. There aren’t any words really to best describe it… just what a stunning place to wander and take it all in with your senses. Unfortunately; I have not been back as frequent though have stayed around the area (Kearney, ON) for random getaways. I am lucky enough to have the opportunity to go anytime since it’s just 2.5 hours outside Toronto and the scenery is spectacular once you hit Hwy 11. A few places you must stop at is The Candy Shoppe and Webers burgers off of Hwy 11 in Orillia.

Claire weaves her narrative of her father’s death in 1991 of a rare cancer and around the same time a random black bear attack of a couple in Algonquin Park. Years later, Claire wanted to better understand the whys around this bear attack occurrence and also come to terms with her own cancer diagnosis with the same rare genetic cancer as her father; while now being married and raising 2 teenaged boys.

Claire has mastered the talent of seamlessly creating stories in her fictional novels. She brings this skill into this memoir. I thoroughly enjoyed the recounting of history, well researched facts, interviews and indigenous peoples of Algonquin. One theme throughout is how much “man” has altered the environment with logging, oil scavenging, increased population entering in what should be left “untouched”. The author puts it in perspective that we should all be questioning any impact as “For what and for whom?”

The authors life journey is entwined into The Bear attack with using comparisons, analysis and analogies. I personally can relate and felt right beside her with the stages of her cancer journey as I have a rare genetic cancer also. The certainty we both share is we can’t control what our body is doing on the inside but we can continue to live and love all around us.

Thank you Claire for allowing us into your journey.

This book surprised me in a good way! I must admit that title and cover drew me in at first 🐻 Kudos to this 🇨🇦 author that really poured her heart and soul into this book ❤️‍🩹

It's an interesting and clever telling. Claire explains about her Father's death and her own devastating cancer diagnosis. She's always had a love of the outdoors and wilderness and in particular bears. This time that love will help her grieve and empower her. There was a black bear attack in one of Canada's National Parks (Algonquin Park in Ontario) in 1991 that has always stayed with her. She goes on a quest to try to understand and find out what really happened. Also we have a third POV and that is of the bear and Claire's imaginings of what might have happened to provoke the attack.

I was lucky to receive both a digital and audiobook copy of this book. I enjoy camping to an extent but I've never been really outdoorsy so this book really surprised me. I couldn't put it down or stop listening to it. I even googled more about the bear attack in 1991 as the book had piqued my interest.

There's so much good research and information in this book. I learned the difference between a grizzly and black bear. I also didn't realize just how similar bears can be to humans. There's also a lot of information about other attacks all over North America. If you love the great parks of Yosemite, Yellowstone or Algonquin (or any other Great Wilderness area) you will most likely enjoy this story.

Publishes March 25, 2025

I'd like to Kindly thank Penguin Random House Canada for granting me access to the digital and audiobook Advanced copies.

Claire shares a wealth of fascinating information - bears, nature camping- and her descriptive writing creates wonderful visuals. The storyline, however, seemed disjointed and jumped around. Between the bear stories and the cancer stories there’s a lot going on.
I enjoyed learning so much about bears and Algonquin Park.
Although the pacing of the narration is uneven, and choppy at times, it is clear. I would recommend this audiobook to anyone who enjoys stories about nature and the great/wild outdoors.
(2.5 rounded up to 3/5)
Thank You to NetGalley and Penguin Random House Canada Audiobooks (Knopf Canada) for the opportunity to listen to the audiobook version of this ARC.