The First Jungle Book (1894) is a collection of stories by the English author Rudyard Kipling. Most of the characters are animals such as Shere Khan the tiger and Baloo the bear, though a principal character is the boy or 'man-cub' Mowgli, who is raised in the jungle by wolves. The stories are set in a forest in India; one place mentioned repeatedly is 'Seonee' (Seoni), in the central state of Madhya Pradesh. A major theme in the book is abandonment followed by fostering, as in the life of Mowg ...