A Whale of the Wild

Published in 2020, Rosanne Parry’s A Whale of the Wild is a middle-grade survival fiction/adventure novel and the second installment of the Voice of the Wilderness series. The story follows Vega, a young orca whale, as she navigates the challenges of the Salish Sea alongside her brother, Deneb. After a devastating tsunami, the siblings embark on a perilous journey to reunite with their pod. The New York Times-bestselling novel was included in the Washington Post Best Children’s Books of the Year (2020) and explores themes of survival, family, and the impacts of human activity on marine life.

Citations in this study guide refer to the eBook edition released by HarperCollins in 2020.

Content Warning: The source material and guide feature depictions of pregnancy loss and animal cruelty and death.

Plot Summary

The novel’s protagonist is a young orca whale named Vega. She lives in the Salish Sea with Greatmother, Mother, her younger brother Deneb, Cousin Aquila, Aquila’s son Altair, and Uncle Rigel. Chinook salmon are the mainstay of their diet, but the fish have become scarce. The lack of food worries Vega because her mother is pregnant with her little sister, Capella.

One day, Vega catches a Silver salmon and shares it with her relatives even though she is so hungry that she momentarily considers eating it herself. Mother and Greatmother decide that Vega has the necessary skills to start leading the family as a wayfinder. However, her first attempt at wayfinding ends in near-disaster when she accidentally leads her family into the path of a ship. Greatmother and Mother guide the pod to safety, but Vega swims away from her relatives the next morning because she is wracked with guilt over endangering them. Aquila finds her cousin and persuades her to return for their kinship’s Gathering, which is like a large family reunion held every summer when the salmon return.

The first day of the Gathering is filled with joyful meetings, dances, and storytelling. That night, Mother goes into labor, but Capella dies before taking her first breath. Vega cannot bear the thought of letting her sister sink into a dark, cold place. To her family’s shock and dismay, she takes the body and speeds away. Vega lays Capella to rest in Blood Cove, the site of a fierce battle waged when Mother was only a baby. Humans captured most of the pod’s younglings, and all but one of the uncles died trying to defend them. This family tragedy makes Vega angry toward humans, but her desire for revenge lessens after she sees a pregnant woman with a small child.

Uncle Rigel asks Deneb to follow Vega and encourage her to return home. The youngling accepts this mission even though he has never ventured away from his pod before. Deneb aspires to be a heroic rescuer like Uncle Rigel, and he believes he’s found his chance when he sees a seal-eating orca trapped by a fishing line. A pair of humans cut the line and free the whale, but Deneb thinks they’ve come to capture his fellow orca. The humans leave after Deneb splashes them, and he congratulates himself on a successful rescue.

Vega sees a group of longboats. She feels a kinship with the longboat riders and recalls stories about a long-ago time when orcas and humans lived in peace and everyone had enough to eat. On her way to rejoin her family, a tsunami, which the whales call a sea shake, blocks her path. Certain that Mother and Greatmother will lead the kinship to the safety of the open ocean, she resolves to meet them there. As she hurries toward the ocean, Vega finds Deneb and the Seal-eater. Together, the three whales dive to dodge towering waves.

Vega, Deneb, and the Seal-eater go to the last island before the open ocean, but their family is not at the appointed meeting place. The Seal-eater kills a seal, shares his catch with Deneb, and then goes his own way. The unfamiliar food makes the youngling ill, and Vega explains to him that all the different sea creatures maintain balance in their ecosystem by only eating the food intended for them.

The sea shake overturns many boats, sending toxins into the water. To protect her little brother, Vega decides that they must journey to the ocean. Greatmother called the ocean the Blue Wilderness and told them that it is filled with monsters. Nonetheless, Vega believes that daring its waters is their best hope of finding both their family and food. She strives to keep up Deneb’s spirits and draws strength from admiring the beauty of the star that is her namesake.

In the ocean, Vega and Deneb meet the Vanished Ones, a long-lost branch of their family. The Vanished Ones eat sharks, and Deneb is injured during a hunt when he defends his sister from a shark. The Vanished Ones leave the siblings behind while Vega tends to her injured brother.

After Deneb heals, Vega decides that it’s time for them to return home because they cannot find food for themselves in the Blue Wilderness. Back at the Gathering Place, they find Aquila and her son but none of their other relatives. Aquila is dangerously thin from nursing Altair, and Vega knows that her cousin will die unless she leads them to salmon soon. Putting aside her doubts, the young wayfinder guides her family through the reshaped seascape to a school of Chinook salmon.

The fish need to swim upriver to lay their eggs, but the river’s mouth is barred by rubble from the sea shake. Vega and her brothers help the longboat riders reopen the mouth of the river, clearing the salmon’s migratory path and preserving the ecosystem’s balance. However, Aquila is terrified of losing the fish again and charges after them. Vega follows her and convinces her cousin to return to the sea with her before they are stranded on dry land. As Vega retakes her position as her little pod’s wayfarer, she is certain that she will lead them to food and to the rest of their family.