The Wolf Gift, Anne Rice
The Wolf Gift, Anne Rice
22 Rating(s)
List: $25.00 | Sale: $17.50
Club: $12.50

The Wolf Gift
The Wolf Gift Chronicles (1)

Author: Anne Rice

Narrator: Ron McLarty

Unabridged: 16 hr 22 min

Format: Digital Audiobook Download

Published: 02/14/2012


Synopsis

NATIONAL BESTSELLER • “Vintage Anne Rice—a lushly written, gothic … metaphysical tale. This time, with werewolves.” —The Wall Street Journal

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.

About Anne Rice

It seems pretty ironic for an author to change from Gothic fiction, erotica, then to Christian literature, but American author, Anne Rice did just that. She was born Howard Allen Frances O'Brian in 1941 in New Orleans. Somehow, being born in New Orleans seems fitting for an author most famous for her popular series of novels entitled, The Vampire Chronicles.

Rice was raised in a Catholic family, but chose to be an agnostic as a young adult. She was very successful coming right out with her first novel......Interview with the Vampire. With that success, she began writing sequels to that novel in the 1980's. In the mid- 2000's, she returned to Catholicism and published novels that were fiction about some happenings in the life of Jesus. She distanced herself several years later from organized religion, siting disagreement with their position on social issues, but vowed her lasting faith in God.

Rice's books have sold over 100 million copies......thus, her immense popularity as an American author. She was married to her husband, Stan Rice, for 41 years until he passed from brain cancer in 2002. They had two children, one who died of leukemia at fie years old, and a son Christopher, who is also an author. Several of her novels have been adapted to film. Many ask about her strange given name...... Howard Allen Frances O'Brien. She answers with......her father's name was Howard, and her mother thought that giving her a man's name would give her advantages in the world as she grew up. On her first day of Catholic School, when the Nun asked her name, she just said Anne because she thought it was a pretty name. The name has served her well.


Reviews

Goodreads review by Jela on December 13, 2022

Before I begin this review I have to mention a few things. I have read several reviews both here on Goodreads and on Amazon and I have to say people don't get it. They don't get this book, they read drivel like 50 Shades of Grey or Twilight and believe that those books are good examples of supernatu......more

Goodreads review by Calista on November 27, 2019

I feel like there was a good book in here, somewhere. She had a plot with a beginning, middle, and end. Well, the plot arch ended and the antagonist was resolved and then the book went on for another 100+ pages just talking about the history of this wolf gift. It was so long. Anne put a lot, and I m......more

Goodreads review by Adrienne on February 18, 2012

So, the Wolf Gift. What can I say? It could only have been written by Anne Rice. I’m actually stumped as to how someone who hasn’t read any of Anne Rice’s books before would feel about this novel. I get the feeling that the world of Anne Rice’s books and the actual world have grown farther and farther......more

Goodreads review by Monica on March 11, 2019

En cuanto escuché que Anne planeaba contar una historia de hombres lobo me emocioné y no fue para menos. Desde las primeras páginas tiene ese toque muy característico que me hizo recordar a las crónicas vampírcas, con personajes sufridos, con una belleza impresionante y en esa atmósfera repleta de os......more

Goodreads review by Paul on October 26, 2016

4.25 stars so much of this story I loved. almost but not quite a perfect novel in my eyes......more


Quotes

The Wolf Gift is vintage Anne Rice—a lushly written, gothic…metaphysical tale. This time, with werewolves.”
—The Wall Street Journal

“Anne Rice has done it again.  In her latest novel, The Wolf Gift, the woman who single-handedly, reinvented the vampire genre puts her formidable talent to work rewriting ‘were-wolf’ lore and in the end succeeds magnificently.”
—Examiner

“[Rice] returns to the lushly evocative scenery and gothic atmosphere of her vampire novels with great success. . . her reimagining of a well-worn mythology is fresh and intriguing. Fans of Rice’s The Vampire Chronicles and The Lives of the Mayfair Witches series should delight in this new saga delivered in the author’s distinctive style. Part creation story, part love story, all excellent!”
—Library Journal (starred)

“I want to howl at the moon over this…I devoured these pages…[A] terrific new novel. . . . The plot [is] magnetic, the characters fascinating, and Rice’s style as solid and engaging as anything she has written since her early vampire chronicle fiction.”
—The Boston Globe
  
“Rice weaves her trademark meditations on the role of supernatural creatures in society into an often thrilling, page-turning yarn”
—Booklist

“[A]n energetic gambol, feisty and terrific fun. . . . [A] fast-paced, heady romp that ranks with her best. . . . Wolf Gift is irresistible.”
—The Dallas Morning News
 
“[I]n Rice’s hands, The Wolf Gift evolves from a fantastical romp into an engrossing thriller. . . .”
—San Francisco Chronicle

“Anne Rice combines a vast literary gift with a shameless love of sex, beauty and pop culture. Her artistic vision is part Bela Lugosi, part Andy Warhol, part Christina the Astonishing, the medieval holy woman who could famously “smell sin.”…The Wolf Gift will leave open-minded readers howling for more.”
—The Globe and Mail
 
“[E]xciting tale of a contemporary werewolf. . . . Rice’s classic concerns regarding good and evil and shifting views of reality play out wonderfully in what will surely please fans and newcomers alike.”
Publishers Weekly
 
“[O]ne part ‘Beauty and the Beast’ love story, one part meditation on morality and immortality, and one part superman tale. . . . Told in the memorable style that won Rice’s vampire series so many readers, The Wolf Gift is an intriguing new take on the classic werewolf legend…Rice deepens and gives nuance to classic werewolf lore.”
—Diana Pinckley, New Orleans Times-Picayune
 
“Rice has never shied away from tackling Big Issues…The Wolf Gift marks a return to form while still giving a nod to spiritual matters…[A] delectable cocktail of old-fashioned lost-race adventure, shape-shifting and suspense.”
-Elizabeth Hand, The Washington Post

“Anne Rice is back”
—The Philadelphia Inquirer

“[W]ritten with compelling modernity…The Wolf Gift is a strong—and welcome—return to the monster mythology that made Anne Rice famous.”
—Shelf Awareness

“With both thrilling acts of horror and a final act that is deeply based in the mythology of the Wolf Gift and its history—and bordering on lycanthropic existentialism—this novel opens readers up to a world they only thought they knew…The characters come alive, and the strange history of the Nideck family will jump off the page and enter the readers’ nightmares as Rice has found a new gothic saga to sink her teeth into.”
—Bookreporter.com