#ReadingLife - No. 3

Over time, you'll probably begin to see a pattern in most of my reading, and that pattern is Distinct Voices. Whatever the genre, whatever the tropes used, I prefer books written with a style and flair all the author's own. That's certainly the case with book three of the year. One page, one paragraph into any Anne Rice book, you know exactly whose work you're reading. 

I bought The Wolf Gift shortly after it was released, but, given the size of my TBR, writing commitments, and general ADD when it comes to reading, I put it up on my shelf to look pretty and collect dust for the last few years. When I heard the news of her passing, I picked it up. 

The Wolf Gift is immediately, unequivocally Anne's particular brand of Gothic, creature-feature horror. It opens on our protagonist, Reuben Golding, a young journalist, interviewing the owner of a grand and gorgeous home on California's redwood coast. Reuben is taken right away with the house, and its owner. After a night together, both are attacked in the wee hours...by men, and by an avenging monster. Reuben survives, and quickly begins undergoing a series of miraculous physical changes, ending up as, you guessed it, a werewolf. 

One of my favorite things about Anne Rice has always been her ability to take a very Classic story, tell it with classical panache and a passion from a bygone era of art, but she always twists the mythos into something uniquely her own. Like with the Vampire Chronicles, she creates a werewolf lore not seen in other werewolf literature, reaching all the way back to the conception of the creatures, touching on their philosophy, their religion - or lack thereof. Rice's monster tales are not wild romps, but introspective tales reminiscent of the Romantic Period, which ask big, theological questions about what it means to be a man versus a monster; questions about morality, and duality, and existence at large. 

In typical Rice fashion, the prose is lush and descriptive, highly visual when it comes to setting and staging. As one would expect it has a certain historic quality to it - and I don't mean this as an insult at all, it's one of the things I've always found most charming about her work. The prose reads as if penned by hand and by candlelight, by someone living in Renaissance times, marveling always at small wonders, simple beauties, and the vastness of the world. This means that the dialogue doesn't feel very modern, even in the mouths of modern characters; it also, in the way of sweeping English Romantic Period fiction, allows characters to feel things deeply and viscerally, loving quickly and powerfully, unbreakable bonds forming almost instantly. Again, this feels very "Classic" to me, and is part of her charm, but don't go into it looking for a gritty, hyper-realistic story. 

Small warning for gore: the wolves tear a lot of people and animals up, and it gets bloody. That's another thing about Anne Rice: she goes there, in whatever story she writes. Her work has always made me a braver writer. At times, I've had ideas, and then told myself they were probably Too Much...but then I asked myself, "What would Anne do?" She would go for it, and if it made people uncomfortable, oh well. 

She was such a powerhouse, and will be missed dearly. While it lacks Lestat - he really does make every book better - The Wolf Gift reads like the early days of the Vampire Chronicles, full of thoughtful monsters and gorgeous settings. I'm glad I finally got to it.