Linger by Maggie Stiefvater
Publisher: Scholastic Press (July 13th, 2011)
Reading Level: Young Adult
Hardcover: 360 pages
Source: Publisher
Series: The Wolves of Mercy Falls #2
Rating: 4 of 5 stars
In Maggie Stiefvater's Shiver, Grace and Sam found each other. Now, in Linger, they must fight to be together. For Grace, this means defying her parents and keeping a very dangerous secret about her own well-being. For Sam, this means grappling with his werewolf past.. and figuring out a way to survive into the future. Add into the mix a new wolf named Cole, whose own past has the potential to destroy the whole pack. And Isabelle, who already lost her brother to the wolves.. and is nonetheless drawn to Cole.
At turns harrowing and euphoric, Linger is a spellbinding love story that explores both sides of love — the light and the dark, the warm and the cold — in a way you will never forget.
Review: I was such a huge fan of Shiver. I was amazed by each detail Maggie placed inside the story. It was beautiful! Much of that continued with Linger, but I will say that I didn't love it as much. Sam and Grace go through a lot in Linger. Grace fights against her parents in order to stay with Sam. It seemed to be typical teenage drama but much more goes along with their love story. Something is happening with Grace and they don't know how to deal with it.
I'm not a big fan of multiple points-of-view and this book seemed to have too many. It often switched from Sam to Grace, to Isabelle and then Cole. I felt that even a majority of the book was focused on Isabelle and Cole.but honestly, that was fine with me because I preferred their story this time around. Sam and Grace were sooo depressed. I understood why but it just made the book harder to read. I felt myself dreading Sam and Grace's POV, and wanting to read more about Cole and Isabelle.
Isabelle is a great character. She is tough, stubborn, and sarcastic. That made the perfect match for Cole. He played the role of the tough guy but there ended up being so much more to him than first expected. Cole has a lot of demons from his past and he soon discovers that no matter what, he can't run from his past life. Isabelle is still going through pain of her own and together they seemed to bring some hope to each other's lives.
Sam and Grace are still strong characters and their level of love for each other cannot be denied. It goes beyond puppy love and each character goes through a lot to be together. They had several scenes that were completely adorable and I do really want to see what happens with them next.
Even though Linger didn't grab me as much as Shiver did, it still built upon a fascinating story. It has many dramatic moments, twists, and surprises. I'm looking forward to reading Forever and seeing what's in store for these characters!
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