Each week on the Friday Book Club we swing open the grand oak doors to the Text Publishing library and pick a book we think will be great for your book club.

This week we’re unleashing Dog Boy by Eva Hornung. Published to great acclaim in 2009, Dog Boy won the Prime Minister’s Literary Award for Fiction in 2010.

Deserted by his family and left to fend for himself in a freezing Moscow apartment, four-year-old Romochka is eventually driven to the streets by hunger. There, among the starving wretches of the city, a wandering boy is of no consequence to passers-by. Romochka must learn to survive or die. Following a street dog to her lair, he joins her pups at their mother’s teat. And so begins Romochka’s life as a dog.

While the story of a child raised by beasts can be traced back to the origins of storytelling, Eva Hornung’s amazing novel explores this tale with such emotional conviction that it casts it in a new and definitive light. Dog Boy explores the disintegration of community, of family; the consequences of social breakdown; the adaptability and survival instincts of the human spirit. This is a novel that compels discussion, that implores you to look at Romochka from the eyes of a parent, a neighbour, a stranger and ask how does society let this happen? If your book club is yet to discover the visceral experience of Dog Boy then follow Romochka through the cold, dark streets of Moscow and learn to love the boy raised by wild dogs.

Visit our resources page to download the reading notes that may help generate discussion within your groups.

Every Friday we’ll be suggesting titles for your book club and providing accompanying resources, so visit us on our website, Facebook or Twitter to find out which title we’ve chosen as our Friday Book Club pick of the week.