Pekan the Shadow is a wildlife story set in the Rocky Mountains of the West. It is the story of Terry Carter, a fourteen-year-old boy who believes any wild creature, even a killer like the fisher, is entitled to live his life the only way he knows — by hunting. Pekan, the fisher, belongs to the weasel tribe, a brownish black animal weighing twelve pounds or more. Terry must find a way to keep Pekan from raiding his father's trap line.