Linger
by Maggie Stiefvater
Book Synopsis (from Goodreads)
the longing.
Once Grace and Sam have found each other, they know they must fight to stay together. For Sam, this means a reckoning with his werewolf past. For Grace, it means facing a future that is less and less certain.
the loss.
Into their world comes a new wolf named Cole, whose past is full of hurt and danger. He is wrestling with his own demons, embracing the life of a wolf while denying the ties of being a human.
the linger.
For Grace, Sam, and Cole, life a constant struggle between two forces – wolf and human – with love baring its two sides as well. It is harrowing and euphoric, freeing and entrapping, enticing and alarming. As their world falls apart, love is what lingers. But will it be enough?
Review
I am not going to compare Linger with Shiver by saying it was better or worse because really, for me, that’s like comparing snowflakes: very different but the same. Linger still had Sam, Grace, Isabel, the cold air, the sad feeling. But it also was different. New character, new point of views, new realizations.
As a Shiver fan, I was worried that these two new point of views (Isabel and Cole) would just be painful chapters while waiting for Sam and Grace to talk, but this was not the case. Part of this is because Maggie’s writing creates a conversation in your head where ten pages feel like one, and when it’s over, you look up and realize that it’s gone, not real.
Another part was because of the characters. Maggie has created real human beings, people who you get to know, love, hate, and care for. A lot of people speculate about who Cole is. Cole is Cole. He is a new character that you have to care for because you get to know him so much. Cole is rather depressing, wanting to simply die or stay wolf forever.
Isabel sets her role in this book too. Isabel is one of the strongest characters I have ever read, dealing with tragedy in her own way, not letting people see through her, saying what needs to be said. Even though Isabel has a stone heart, she has an incredibly big one.
Grace and Sam have to deal with something both of them can’t stop. Parents.
Although Grace’s parents have never been around, they make her relationship with Sam more difficult, not understanding the circumstances. Linger was able to put me in a spot of pure hopelessness. It goes through dark holes, hits bottom, and you can’t get out. Linger’s last chapters gave a definition of hopelessness: no one able to make a move, no one able to fix things, to stop them.
I kept thinking: this is what it feels like when time slows down and you see a bullet come right at you, but you can’t move—nothing` to do. You keep waiting for Superman to come to the rescue but realize that he’s not exactly real.
Linger was not as… action-packed as Shiver, but it was still full of everything it needed and more.
Maggie gave us a scientific view of werewolves, gave us 4 completely different humans, gave us love, sorrow, happiness.
She gave us Linger! I truly loved it.
Thank you Maggie!