Linger by Maggie Stiefvater

Title: Linger (Wolves of Mercy Falls #2)

Author: Maggie Stiefvater
Publisher: Scholastic, Inc.
Acquired: Bought
Age Group: Young Adult

Grade: 81% or B-

Buy It: Amazon

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.

My Thoughts::
It's been more than a year since I've read Shiver, and I wasn't really planning on reading its sequel or the third book in the trilogy when they came out. But during the summer I won a copy of Forever, the third book, and decide to just buy a copy of Linger and read them. I didn't hate or even dislike Shiver. Actually, I'm not even sure why I didn't automatically buy Linger.

Unfortunately I started out this book almost unbearably confused. I read the first book so long ago and read so many book after, that I forgot a lot of the major plot happenings. I had to do a bit of research to get everything straightened out in my mind, though this wasn't the book's fault of course. What was the book's fault was that NOTHING happened until the end. It was all just a whole bunch of build up for something that we all knew was going to happen anyway. So, I was often bored because books need plot right?

I understand that a lot of the book focused on character development and suspense building and all that jazz. But the suspense was ruined because readers are smart. The character development was okay, but it accounted for too much of the book. The only thing that it did was make my emotions a bit higher when very bad or very good things happened to them. Adding a new character to the mix was a great idea, because without his and Isabelle's side plot, I don't know if I could have made it. Every chapter about Sam and Grace felt the same as the one before it. Cole's and Isabelle's brought continuing excitement.

The ending was nice and makes me really want to read Forever, which I guess is good for a book that isn't a standalone to do. Because when things WERE happening? I really liked this book. I was caught off guard by the boring-ness of the second book in a trilogy. Unless Forever is jam packed with action, I don't know why there need to be three books.

Overall I liked the book but wasn't excited about the lack of action. The first book was so mysterious and sweet, but Linger just laid it all out. Maybe if I would have read it closer to reading Shiver, I would have cared more about the characters.