'I was surprised when my eye was caught by an advertisement: wolf cubs for sale. A few hours later I was paying $500 to the woman who had placed the ad. I took my wolf cub home with me that very afternoon. And there we began thrashing out the terms of our acquaintance.'

This fascinating book charts the relationship between Mark Rowlands, a rootless and restless philosopher, and Brenin, his extraordinarily well-travelled wolf. Brenin goes everywhere with Rowlands, even to his philosophy lectures, where he lies in the corner of the lecture hall and dozes. More than just an exotic pet, Breinin exerted an immense influence on Rowlands as both a person, and, strangely enough, as a philosopher. He led Rowlands to re-evaluate his attitude to love, happiness, nature and death.

By turns funny (what do you do when your wolf eats your air-conditioning unit?) and poignant (in the pages describing Brenin's last weeks with Rowlands), this is a life-affirming book that will make you reappraise what it means to be human.