From HollywoodCrush.MTV.Com Posted 10/8/09
Every new young adult novel with some kind of supernatural element in it that gets optioned for a movie is inevitably labeled “the next ‘Twilight.’ ” But Maggie Stiefvater’s “Shiver,” the screen rights to which were just picked up by Unique Features, actually has very little in common with the vampire saga. Except for one thing: After finishing it, I had that same dazed, achy feeling of loss and longing.
That’s particularly fitting this time around, because what on the surface is the story of a girl who falls in love with the werewolf who saved her life is really a story about loss and longing. The book’s title and setting, in northern Minnesota during the fall and winter, don’t make it any cheerier. Warning: Do not read this while listening to mournful music (say, Bon Iver) on a cloudy day — the consequences are painful. But I mean this all as praise. After devouring dozens of fast-paced, very plot-centric books, you sometimes need to settle down and sink in to something slower and more contemplative. You need to be reminded that sometimes words can reach into your chest and wrench your heart.
Grace Brisbane was 6 years old when a pack of starving wolves grabbed her from the swing in her backyard. Sam Roth was 7, but he managed to stop his pack from eating the little girl. In the years that follow, Grace becomes obsessed with “her” yellow-eyed wolf, and by the time she’s 16, her friends begin to think it’s a little creepy. And it is creepy when the wolf finally lets her approach him and bury her hands in his fur. Even though we know he’s actually a werewolf, she doesn’t at first, and her feelings toward this animal seem kinda wrong. But the fact that half of the story is told from Sam’s perspective, both as a wolf and as a human, begins to make the ick factor go away a bit. And by the time he shows up on her doorstep, human, naked and bleeding from a gunshot wound, their relationship goes from taboo to perfectly natural — if horribly doomed from the start.
This isn’t the kind of supernatural love story we’ve become accustomed to. The werewolf thing seems to be more like a virus than magic. And rather than lots of overwrought conversations about things like fate, souls and evil, the book is full of sweet scenes of everyday life: hanging out in a bookstore, watching bad TV-movies, baking a quiche. In those very normal moments, the sad truth — that Sam will soon turn into a wolf forever — looms over them in stark contrast, making it more heartbreaking than if they were given to dramatic speeches. (Those were also the moments when I had to put the book down and come up for air, reminding myself of my own, perfectly happy life.) When the action breaks into those scenes — a new, unhappy werewolf threatens to expose them; an unstable she-wolf is jealous of Grace — it’s hard not to be annoyed by the interruption.
This is going to be a tricky movie to make, I think. To do it right, it’s got to match the book’s natural, moody feeling without getting melodramatic — and use real wolves, not CGI. And since so much of the story takes place in the characters’ heads, they’d better cast some damn good actors. Any ideas?
