The Wolf Gift: The Wolf Gift Chronicles Author: Anne Rice | Language: English | ISBN:
B0060AY8K2 | Format: EPUB
The Wolf Gift: The Wolf Gift Chronicles Description
A daring new departure from the inspired creator of
The Vampire Chronicles (“unrelentingly erotic . . . unforgettable”—
The Washington Post),
Lives of the Mayfair Witches (“Anne Rice will live on through the ages of literature”—
San Francisco Chronicle), and the angels of
The Songs of the Seraphim (“remarkable”—Associated Press). A whole new world—modern, sleek, high-tech—and at its center, a story as old and compelling as history: the making of a werewolf, reimagined and reinvented as only Anne Rice, teller of mesmerizing tales, conjurer extraordinaire of other realms, could create.
The time is the present.
The place, the rugged coast of Northern California. A bluff high above the Pacific. A grand mansion full of beauty and tantalizing history set against a towering redwood forest.
A young reporter on assignment from the
San Francisco Observer . . . An older woman welcoming him into her magnificent family home that he has been sent to write about and that she must sell with some urgency . . . A chance encounter between two unlikely people . . . An idyllic night—shattered by horrific unimaginable violence, the young man inexplicably attacked—bitten—by a beast he cannot see in the rural darkness . . . A violent episode that sets in motion a terrifying yet seductive transformation, as the young man, caught between ecstasy and horror, between embracing who he is evolving into and fearing what he will become, soon experiences the thrill of the wolf gift.
As he resists the paradoxical pleasure and enthrallment of his wolfen savagery and delights in the power and (surprising) capacity for good, he is caught up in a strange and dangerous rescue and is desperately hunted as “the Man Wolf” by authorities, the media, and scientists (evidence of DNA threatens to reveal his dual existence) . . . As a new and profound love enfolds him, questions emerge that propel him deeper into his mysterious new world: questions of why and how he has been given this gift; of its true nature and the curious but satisfying pull towards goodness; of the profound realization that there may be others like him who are watching—guardian creatures who have existed throughout time who possess ancient secrets and alchemical knowledge. And throughout it all, the search for salvation for a soul tormented by a new realm of temptations, and the fraught, exhilarating journey, still to come, of being and becoming, fully, both wolf and man.
This edition features an excerpt from Anne Rice's latest novel
The Wolves of Mid-Winter.
- File Size: 1706 KB
- Print Length: 418 pages
- Page Numbers Source ISBN: 0307595110
- Publisher: Anchor (February 14, 2012)
- Sold by: Random House LLC
- Language: English
- ASIN: B0060AY8K2
- Text-to-Speech: Enabled
X-Ray:
- Lending: Not Enabled
- Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #4,304 Paid in Kindle Store (See Top 100 Paid in Kindle Store)
- #2
in Kindle Store > Kindle eBooks > Mystery, Thriller & Suspense > Suspense > Paranormal > Werewolves & Shifters - #78
in Books > Science Fiction & Fantasy > Fantasy > Paranormal
- #2
in Kindle Store > Kindle eBooks > Mystery, Thriller & Suspense > Suspense > Paranormal > Werewolves & Shifters - #78
in Books > Science Fiction & Fantasy > Fantasy > Paranormal
It has been years since I've read an Anne Rice novel, and I was initially hesitant about this one. However, the premise sounded interesting, so I ordered it anyway just out of curiosity. I'm very glad that I did. I started this book day before yesterday, but late in the evening , and went to bed only a couple of chapters in. I picked it up again yesterday afternoon - and by the time I realized that it was far past my bedtime, I was almost finished and NEEDED to see how it ended.
Reuben is a fledgling reporter in San Francisco, the youngest son of a fairly well-to-do family. He heads up to Mendocino County to do a story about an old house with a lot of history being sold. He finds himself falling in love with the place, but wakes during the night to hear his host being attacked. As he goes to defend her, he is attacked himself, and then mysteriously saved. During his recovery, he finds that he is...changing. He is becoming what he always assumed was a werewolf. But as he learns more about himself and his new abilities, he has to decide whether what is has been given is actually a curse - or whether it is truly a gift.
The Wolf Gift is not your typical werewolf story - it turns the genre on its head in more than one way. There is a strong thread of Good vs. Evil within the story, but the parts are not necessarily played by those you would expect. How does one know true Evil? Can something seen as evil actually be a servant of Good? Tied to the Good and Evil debate is a strong exploration of the existence of God, and our expectations of right and wrong.
However. This is not a heavy-handed religion book.
Anne Rice's latest offering, "The Wolf Gift," marks her long awaited return to the Gothic Horror genre in which her popular Mayfair Witch and Vampire Chronicles reside, bringing the ancient werewolf myth, with certain strange new twists, into modern times. "The Wolf Gift" weaves a tale of complex moral questions, stark violence and monstrous brutality against a hauntingly picturesque Northern California.
Charmingly, in the Wolf Gift Ms. Rice has created her most eloquent tribute to the writers of the 1800s, those who wrote older Werewolf stories to which her "Distinguished Gentleman" sometimes refer. She sets the story not in summer, but in the perpetually rainy and overcast Bay Area of Wintertime, evoking images of Victorian Gothic Novels with their London weather. She paints her forests with damp under brush and rolling fogs, her architecture - especially the increasingly mysterious mansion at Nideck Point in Mendocino - with secret places, trapped doors, and the same kind of detailed and loving brush which caused Gothic Horror to be named for its Gothic architecture.
But below all of this is a modern take on the coming-of-age story. Set in the present, its protagonist is very unlike Interview with the Vampire's Louis, who had and lost a wife and family by the age of 25: Reuben is the modern boy-man; still unsure of who he is at the age of 23, and completely unable to break away from the expectations of a brilliant, overbearing mother. Intelligent and creative, but naive and sheltered, two years out of college, he is still having trouble defending starting out on a career path of his own choosing, and is still living at home with his parents. Even his girlfriend seems to be someone chosen to please his family.
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