Winner of the Bologna Strega Ragazzi Prize 2020
"A not-to-be-missed tale of courage and compassion."–Katherine Applegate
The incredible story of a boy’s quest to give the ultimate gift to a caged wild animal: freedom.
London, 1880, 13-year-old Clay is a mud lark, scavenging on the banks of the Thames for anything he might sell for money to buy food. One day Clay goes to the camp of the circus that has newly arrived in town and meets Ollie, a girl about his age, who lives with the circus. Ollie brings him to the cage of “the last wolf in England”. Mist, as he calls it, is fierce, angry, and indomitable, perhaps due to the cruel treatment of its tamers, which Clay secretly witnesses. From that moment on, Clay is resolved to give the wolf its freedom and return it to the wild. But first he must build trust with the wolf and, with Ollie’s help, find a way to release Mist back into the wild. This suspenseful novel will have readers rooting for Clay and Mist as they navigate their way through the obstacles that lay in their path.