The Man Who Spoke Snakish Av Andrus Kivirahk

<p><i>Unfortunately people and tribes degenerate. They lose their teeth, forget their language, until finally they're bending meekly on the fields and cutting straw with a scythe.</i><br><br>Leemut, a young boy growing up in the forest, is content living with his hunter-gatherer family. But when incomprehensible outsiders arrive aboard ships and settle nearby, with an intriguing new religion, the forest begins to empty - people are moving to the village and breaking their backs tilling fields to make bread. Meanwhile, Leemut and the last forest-dwelling humans refuse to adapt: with bare-bottomed primates and their love of ancient traditions, promiscuous bears, and a single giant louse, they live in shacks, keep wolves, and speak to snakes.<br><br>Told with moving and satirical prose, <i>The Man Who Spoke Snakish</i> is a fiercely imaginative allegory about a boy, and a nation, standing on the brink of dramatic change.</p>