Series: The Wolves of Mercy Falls by Maggie Stiefvater

People a really quite generous. Schools, even private ones, don't have expansive budgets. So, when they are getting rid of things, they often think of us. That includes books. The problem is, people don't always think through what a school can actually use. When it comes to the random stuff, it's just a bit of a chore. Someone sorts through the items, evaluates them, and either finds them a home at the school or donates them on to a place that can use them.

Books are different. To start with, when people donate books it's not usually just one or two. Usually, it's at least a full box and often more than one. Additionally, there are so many books out there and most of them are good, in their way. Its not just an issue of quality, it's an issue of interest, content, lexile range, topic appropriateness, teen interest, and etc.  So the librarian, Susan, and I usually end up sitting at a table going through them. Usually we sort into three piles: 1. donate on because inappropriate or out of date in some way, 2. books destined for the media center or a classroom library because we know them and they are good, and 3. Lydia's pile. Lydia's pile is the books we've never heard of or we are unsure of in some way so someone has to read them. No one else on the campus reads the way I do, so I'm the someone.

I find a lot of new books this way. The first book in the Wolves of Mercy Falls series, Shiver, came to me that way.

I read Shiver in a little under a day. It's a YA novel aimed at a high school or early 20s female reader. At it's core, the series is a supernatural romance with a sort of Beauty and the Beast feel to it. Parents might object to to a couple of the choices of the protagonists, but I think it's worth it for the way it really addresses those same issues in a head on manner.

Sam is a werewolf. Grace is not, but she should be. Sam has loved Grace from afar for years, ever since a wolf dragged her as a little girl off a tire swing. He was a wolf at the time and saved her from the pack, then he wait for her to change into a wolf too but she never did. And so, he never approached her because who needs a werewolf in their life?

Grace loves the wolves and particularly the one that watches her from the line of trees behind her Minnesota house. However, when Jack, a teenager at Grace's highschool gets mauled by a wolf, the wolves are suddenly in danger. Circumstances through Sam and Grace together for the first time.

Stiefvater takes a variation on the whole werewolf thing. Her wolves change because it's cold. So when they shift, it is for the whole winter, and they become human for the summer. However, the werewolf bug is like a disease and they stay wolves longer and longer each year until one year they just never become human again. It's a fun twist.

I enjoyed the series.

1. Shiver
2. Linger
3. Forever