Even though books about the Canadian wilderness portray grizzly bears

The comma+ing adverbial modifier namely 'roaring' modifies just not the books in the context but the books' portrayal of the animals as the savage ones. Let us appreciate that roaring is not an adjectival modifier.

So, does that mean they could refer to animals here? and Why not Grizzly bears?

Yes. 'They' does refer to the bears. Logically, it does not matter whether 'they' refers to the bears or the animals as long as that plural word is not taken to refer to the books just because that is an another plural word.

Thought C but .........................................
Why A is correct...

Even though books about the Canadian wilderness portray grizzly bears as savage animals, roaring ferociously from the peaks of snow covered mountains, in reality they are playful and sociable and only attack if they or their cubs are threatened.

A) books about the Canadian wilderness portray grizzly bears as savage animals, roaring ferociously from the peaks of snow covered mountains,

B) in books about the Canadian wilderness portray grizzly bears as savage animals, roaring ferociously from the peaks of snow covered mountains,

C) grizzly bears are portrayed in books about the Canadian wilderness as savage animals, roaring ferociously from the peak tops of snow covered mountains,

D) books about the Canadian wilderness portray grizzly bears as if they were savage animals, roaring ferociously from the peak tops of snow covered mountains,

E) books about the Canadian wilderness portray grizzly bears to be savage animals, roaring ferociously from the peaks of snow covered mountains,

Option A is correct ,since the roaring ferocioulsy is refering to the savage animals,the modifier ing can modify both the noun before the comma or the phrase.

We will get the correct perspective if we decide what or which is doing the act of roaring ferociously. If we attribute the adverbial modifier 'roaring' to the "books" and their portrayal, then the meaning is woefully absurd as in A , B ,D and E. One can't expect books portrayal to be roaring.
Whereas, in C, the act of roaring is being portrayed as done by the bears. That is why C is distinctly superior to all the others.
What still spoils the show even in C is the clumsy manner of writing one part in passive voice and the other in active voice.

Replying to a request from AR15J:

First, this is not one of ours! Manhattan Review is a different company, so I don't want to take credit for this one.

I see two flaws in this question:

*The use of "even though" at the beginning isn't the best. We're saying that even though books portray them this way, grizzlies are still able to be sociable. This implies that grizzlies somehow manage to be sociable despite their portrayal in the media. We'd be better off with a more neutral contrast word, such as "while" or "although."

*Answer A shouldn't have a comma before "roaring." It's clearly meant to modify "bears," not the preceding clause/action, and we generally omit the comma for noun modifiers in -ing form unless we need to add a comma for clarity.

Disregarding those flaws, A is the best choice we have for the following reasons:

*There's nothing wrong with the use of "they" in A. Although it's true that when in doubt we assume that a pronoun refers back to the subject of the clause, there's no doubt here. No reasonable reader is going to be confused about whether books or bears are playful and sociable. This is definitely a non-issue.

*The use of the redundant "peak tops" in C is enough to make it wrong.

*The rearrangement in C is not really helpful. We don't need to make bears the subject, and to accomplish this, we've had to move the modifiers in a way that impedes the flow of ideas. The modifier "as savage animals" has been separated from the verb "portray" by two prepositional phrases. This isn't so much wrong as annoying and unnecessary. There may be sentences where that form is needed, but we don't need it here.

Agree that "A" is fine, but could not understand what is wrong with "C".

the peak tops of : INCORRECT
the peaks of : CORRECT

Honestly,
I believe the flaw 'peak tops' is very much less significant than the fact that 'they' in the following sentence seems to be modifying books instead of bears.

One important thing to keep in mind is that 'peak' is the right usage 'peak tops' are redundant usage of words ....1

and as is the right reaoning since ferocity is associated with savagenous .....2

A) books about the Canadian wilderness portray grizzly bears as savage animals, roaring ferociously from the peaks of snow covered mountains,
This follows both rules do -Hence in

B) in books about the Canadian wilderness portray grizzly bears as savage animals, roaring ferociously from the peaks of snow covered mountains,
Here the use of in is redundant it cannot be portrayed anywhere other than the inside the books -Hence out

C) grizzly bears are portrayed in books about the Canadian wilderness as savage animals, roaring ferociously from the peak tops of snow covered mountains,
This flaunts rule no 1 -Hence out

D) books about the Canadian wilderness portray grizzly bears as if they were savage animals, roaring ferociously from the peak tops of snow covered mountains,
Similar reasoning as C - Hence out

E) books about the Canadian wilderness portray grizzly bears to be savage animals, roaring ferociously from the peaks of snow covered mountains
To be is not the right use of words hence out
Hence IMO A

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