Shiver

After reading the blurbs on inside of the front cover, I was thinking it was going to be a Twilight wannabe. I started reading and still had the same opinion: substitute werewolves for vampires. Although I have not read the Twilight books they are so everywhere that I feel as if I have read them, more than one time. Anyway, as I got deeper into Shiver, I decided it did not matter anyway. I liked the story I was reading not the one in the movies, etc. I think the author did a fine job with the werewolf changes due to the cold and heat and not the moon, which is all everybody has ever heard. I don't know if there is any real basis for the cold/heat idea, but it made for a good story. Even though I usually steer clear of romance books, Shiver had enough of everything else that I was hooked. Sam appears to be the kind of young man that every girl would want: sweet, funny, thoughtful. So he had a little werewolf problem!
I did like how the author used Grace and Sam as narrators, flipping back and forth so the reader could experience the ideas and emotions of both main characters. By getting into their heads, it made me feel like I knew them and cared what happened to them. I felt bad for the home life Grace had to endure. It reminded me of Going Bovine, where the father was a workaholic and the mother appeared so spaced out or just not with it. Also, as we discussed in class, the author had the parents make so few appearances that the teens were left to deal with events on their own. Most teen readers like that scenario anyway.
I could not decide about Beck. At first I thought what a great person and then things came out and I was going uh oh. He seemed decent enough and he really appeared to care about Sam. Guilt? Maybe, but Sam apparently thrived on what Beck taught him over the years and turned into a fine person(werewolf?). Everybody has skeletons in the closet and Beck did too. I think he would not have been as credible if he had always done good on everything he touched. Nobody is that perfect! Exposing his faults made him seem so real and human and we could all compare him to somebody we know. By the end, I am still of the opinion that he was a good guy, just maybe not a great guy.
I liked this book well enough that I emailed a friend of mine who likes wolves and told her about it. If she does read it I hope she will let me know her opinion. I 'm curious!
I admit I was sweating the end of it. It could end only one way, and I was prepared to heave the book against the wall if the author thought otherwise. She didn't, so the book and the wall are fine. Now we just need a sequel with some little Sams and Graces.... What a story their parents could tell them.