Maggie Stiefvater writes lovely YA paranormal romance. That being said what really stands out for me is the excellent way Stiefvater writes; it's magic, poetic, heartbreaking and I didn't want it to stop. Welcome back to Mercy Falls. If you haven't yet read Shiver then I strongly suggest you skip this review and take a look at my review of Shiver instead. It's difficult to review this second installment without major spoilers from the first one.
Sam and Grace are planning their future together, life is good but soon enough there's trouble in paradise. One of the new wolves shifts back into its human form brining unexpected danger to the rest of the pack. Even more disturbing than the new wolf is the discovery of a dead wolf on the Culpepper property.
My thoughts:
Maggie Stiefvater is a gifted writer but not only that; she is also a wonderful painter and writer of music. I listened to the audiobook version of Linger and at the very end the combination of Stiefvater's words and music brought tears to my eyes. The music gave the writing another level of depth.
Here is an example of how Maggie Stiefvater instead of saying just unattractive can convey that to her readers in a very interesting way(those doing my Memorable Monday Meme will remember this quote):
The door opened, revealing another Labrador, this one very much alive, and a twenty-something girl with a red bandanna tied around her head. She was so interesting-looking and unpretty that she actually traveled through ugly to someplace on the other side that was almost as good as pretty: huge, beaked nose, sleepy-looking dark brown eyes, and sharp cheekbones. Her black hair was pulled up in a half a-dozen interconnected braids coiled on top of her head, like a Mediterranean Princess Leia.
For me the story in the Wolves of Mercy Falls trilogy is about how precious life is. How you should treasure every moment with your loved ones and hold on to the good memories. Now I'm pretty sure none of us will ever experience having a boyfriend or a girlfriend turned into a wolf, but the wolf part can be used as a metaphor for a lot of other things.
Now for the characters; as much as I like Sam and Grace I'm sorry to say that they lose the battle for my attention to Isabel and Cole. I'm guessing that if you've read these books you know that all of Stiefvater's characters have serious issues with their families. Sam's background might be a bit to tragic and heartbreaking for me to really buy into his story and if I was Grace I would have acted out a lot more at home. So I guess I can easier relate to, at least, Isabel, without ever having been much of the rebel myself. Cole on the other hand I just like why I'm not even sure I could tell you. He's been quite the annoying type, but he had his reasons for it.
I would characterize this story as character driven. You connect with the characters on such a deep level that you don't need a neck-breaking adventure on how they're going to stop the sky falling down on their heads.
My rating of this novel:
/
Source:
Audiobook purchased from Audible.
This book can be purchased from a number of local retailers and on-line book stores such as Amazon and The Book Depository (I'm not an affiliate of either). The latter store does by the way have free shipping to about 100 countries.
