Shiver: a Review

Shiver: a quick review

Shiver is the story of Grace and Sam, wolves, teen angst and the biting cold of winter. Stiefvater has an interesting and original twist to the werewolf mythos, and at times her prose can be quite lyrical. Unfortunately I found the switching back and forth between Grace and Sam chapters quite tedious as well as some of the extremely short chapters, but this could just be me nitpicking at literary things that make me twitch.

The “romance” of the characters was by far the longest section of the novel, which was drawn out and occasionally bland to read and made the conflict towards the end of the novel feel rather tacked on the end. Although Grace and Sam had believable character development, the secondary characters are thinly fleshed out. I would have loved to have read more about Olivia, and her friendship with Grace at the expense of Sam‘s terrible song writing (seriously squeamishly nauseating stuff).

As far as teen paranormal romances go this one has a heart of silver at the very least. The characters are believably flawed as human and wolf alike which made for an enjoyable read. Amazon reveals that there is a follow up book, Linger, which I don’t think I will be reading as I think any further stretching out of the story into a series would ruin the first novel, unless it was central to other characters leaving Grace and Sam behind. It’s worth a read if you like teen fiction, and far better written than the likes of the dreaded Twilight books.

New Books for January

Happy New Year (if a little belated) to all of our Book Clubbers worldwide!
The instore club is now back from its holiday break (and its snow induced on last week) so don't forget to pop on down again tomorrow night onwards (if you're local!) 19:30-21:30. Bring a pen and paper for our creative session too.

Our new books for January are as follows:

Shiver, by Maggie Stiefvater: The wolves are calling. Everything you know will change.

The pack circled around me, tongues and teeth and growls. When a local boy is killed by wolves, Grace's small town becomes a place of fear and suspicion. But Grance can't help being fascinated by the pack, and by one yellow-eyed wolf in particular. There's something about him - something almost human. Then she meets a yellow - eyed boy whose familiarity takes her breath away.....

A chilling love story that will have you hooked from the very first page.

Sacrifice, by S.J. Bolton, You're born, you live, they die.

Moving to remote Shetland has been unsettling enough for consultant surgeon Tora Hamilton, even before the gruesome discovery she makes one rain-drenched afternoon.....

'The corpse I could cope with. It was the context that threw me...'

Deep in the peat soil of her field she uncovers the body of a young woman. The heart has been removed, and marks etched into the skin bear an eerie resemblance to carvings Tora has seen in her own cellar.

'and there I'd been, thinking the day couldn't possibly get any worse.'

But as Tora begins to ask questions, terrifying threats start tolling in like the cold island mists....

'Splendidly crafted, deeply disturbing...This debut novel will deservedly be a bestseller' The Times.

Dead Witch Walking, by Kim Harrison. She'll bring them back alive, dead....or undead.

Forty years ago a genetically engineered virus killed half the world's human population and exposed creatures of dreams and nightmares that had, until then, lived in secret alongside humanity.

Rachel Morgan is a runner with the Inderland Runner Services, apprehending criminals throughout modern-day Cincinnati. She is also a witch.

Used to confronting criminal vampires, dark witches and homicidal werewolves, Rachel's latest assignments - apprehending cable-stealing magic students and tax-evading leprechauns - have prompted her to break her thirty-year contract with the I.S. and start her own runner agency.

But no one quits the I.S.

Marked for death, Rachel is a dead witch walking unless she can appease her former employers and pay off her contract by exposing the city's most prominent citizen as a drug lord. But making an enemy of the ambiguous Trent Kalamack proves even more deadly than leaving the I.S.