Linda
Written on Jun 16, 2010
Grace is fascinated by the wolves in the woods behind her house; one yellow-eyed wolf in particular. Every winter, she watches him, but every summer, he disappears. Sam leads two lives. In winter, he stays in the frozen woods, with the protection of the pack. In summer, he has a few precious months to be human ...until the cold makes him shift back again. When Grace and Sam finally meet, they realize they can't bear to be apart. But as winter nears, Sam must fight to stay human - or risk losing himself, and Grace, for ever.
- ISBN10 0545227259
- ISBN13 9780545227254
- Publish Date 1 August 2009
- Publish Status Active
- Imprint Scholastic Paperbacks
- Format eBook
- Pages 400
- Language English
Reviews
sstaley
Written on Jun 7, 2010
This past weekend I finished "Shiver" by Maggie Stiefvater. I had really looked forward to reading this book. I had heard many good things from my friends who had already read "Shiver".
As I have read reader's reviews on goodreads.com, I noticed most of the reviews were "I really loved it!" to "I didn't like it at all". I am truly somewhere in between. This wasn't a bad book, but it didn't leave me with that "WOW" factor that I would recommend this book to all of my friends . I was instead left with a "ho-hum" attitude. I have been trying to put my finger on how I feel about this book. The premise is great and I like how the temperature affects when a wolf changes into a human and then the human changes back into a werewolf. I just felt like more could have been put into the plot. I also didn't like the fact that the werewolf is not a supernatural being that does anything exciting; it's just a wolf. At least in the Twilight series the werewolves have incredible strength and have the same awareness that they had when they were human.
Another problem I have with this book for teens, was how easy and "right" it was for the main characters to sleep together and eventually have sex. This is not the message I want to send to my daughter or to other teens. I also hated how Grace's parents had no clue that she had Sam in her room all of those many nights/ weeks. **sigh**
I know that I will read the sequel, "Linger" when it comes out soon.{I have the book on hold at the library} I am hoping that it has more of a storyline to keep me interested. I really wanted to like this book a lot, but it truly was missing something for me; so this book gets 3 stars.
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go visit my book review blog at
http://www.whynotbecauseisaidso.blogspot.com
Jo
Written on Apr 9, 2010
You have no idea how excited I was to read this book. I had read rave reviews all over about Shiver, and being about werewolves, how could I possibly not love it? Well, as it turns out werewolves don’t make all books brilliant.
Did I hate it? No, I really loved the beginning, and the end was just perfect. The middle, however, was a disappointment. My Dad has drummed it into me ever since I was young that if I start reading a book, I have to finish it. “How do you know you don’t like a book until you’ve finished it?” he would always ask. So I can’t not finish a book now, I have to read it to the end. I could have given up on this book days ago – as it is, it’s taken me 13 days to read it, and that’s just ridiculous. I’m glad I did finish it though, because my Dad was right; the end has changed my opinion of Shiver. Whereas I didn’t like it before the end, it’s kind of ok now. But barely.
As always, I’ll start with the positives. The beginning was something I could almost relate to. Grace has this great affinity with the woods and the wolves that live in them every winter, since she was attacked by the wolves when she was younger. One wolf, her wolf, with bright yellow eyes, has always come to the edge of the wood’s by Grace house, and they would spend hours just staring at each other with such intensity. Those moments felt so strong to me, very powerful, and I thought I was in for such a awesome read. Then the wolf became human, and things fell a little flat. I also liked how it was written. Almost each alternating chapter was from one or the other, Grace or Sam. It was great to get both points of view, to know what both were thinking.
The last fifty or so pages of the book were the most hooking, once I got to those, I could hardly put the book down. There was one moment that was just so beautiful yet so sad that I almost cried. The very end was just so perfect, it was brilliant.
As I’ve said, however, the middle let me down. Apart from those moments at the very beginning, I didn’t relate to Grace, and I didn’t particularly care about her. I can’t say why though, it’s not that there was no personality, or not enough depth, she just wasn’t really my sort of person. Same about Sam really, he was lovely, but not amazing. And I can’t say there was any chemistry between them. There were a lot of sweet moments, but I just didn’t feel it, it wasn’t believable to me.
This is more of a paranormal romance rather than an urban fantasy. What little action there is in the book happens elsewhere, so we only get told about it rather than see it. There isn’t much else to say, really. I don’t know if I’ll be reading Linger, when it comes out in the UK 5th July. It sounds pretty good, but so did Shiver. We’ll see. Over all a disappointing book that was just saved by the ending.
From Once Upon a Bookcase - YA book blog.
rakesandrogues
Written on Mar 7, 2010
I'm glad that all the lingering questions in my head were answered. The obvious ones about the weather and various loose ends. I really thought that the most obvious plothole would go unanswered after reading more than half of the book, but thank goodness Stiefvater did not disappoint!
Good endings are rare. Sometimes they're completely drawn out and overdone, and sometimes there are just no words to explain how it just wasn't right. To me, endings give the lasting impression to a book and it's important how it ends. Shiver ended so beautifully. It left me hanging for more, but at the same time left me satisfied as a reader.
I honestly thought I'd never like a werewolf book (over my dead body!), but I was so wrong. I cannot wait for more.
funstm
Written on Jan 1, 2010