Werewolves discussion

This topic has been created for discussing Spring 2022's group book: The Werewolf Megapack. The following are its contents:

Leopard (2009) short story by Jay Lake
Gabriel-Ernest (1909) short story by Saki
Sympathy for Wolves (1998) short story by John Gregory Betancourt
The Drone (1934) short fiction by A. Merritt
The Were-Wolf (1890) novelette by Clemence Housman
And Bob's Your Uncle (2010) short fiction by Chelsea Quinn Yarbro
The Mark of the Beast (1890) short story by Rudyard Kipling
Dumpster Diving (1995) short story by Nina Kiriki Hoffman
The Werewolf (1896) short story by Eugene Field
The Wolf (1890) short story by Guy de Maupassant
Wolves of Darkness (1932) novella by Jack Williamson
The Man Who Was Changed into a Crow short story by P'u Sung-Ling
Hugues, the Wer-Wolf (1838) short story by Sutherland Menzies
The White Wolf of the Hartz Mountains (1839) short story by Frederick Marryat
The She-Wolf (1912) short story by Saki
Morraha (1894) short story by Joseph Jacobs
The Other Side: A Breton Legend (1893) short story by Eric Stenbock
The White Wolf of Kostopchin (1957) novelette by Sir Gilbert Campbell
The Wolf Leader (1857) novel by Alexandre Dumas
The Hunter's Moon short story by Michael McCarty and Terrie Leigh Relf
Werewolf of the Sahara (1936) novelette by G. G. Pendarves
Evil Forces novelette by Gary Lovisi

As you can see from this list, a lot of these are really old classics. The other anthology this month is far more contemporary. I like classics. Zain must enjoy more the modern hits. Which do you prefer?

I prefer the modern tropes.

A well written story is a well written story regardless of age, but I do enjoy the particular style of those old stories.

I enjoy reading the old stories, but I like the mythos of the modern books.

Not that lovey-dovey mess.

I'm already about a quarter of the way into this collection and am really enjoying it. There's not a mediocre or worse story yet. That's why I nominated it for group read this spring.

Another benefit to reading a collection of classics like this in one megapack is that a lot of the stories are listed in GoodReads individually. It's like getting multiple credit for reading just one anthology, and if you like to do reviews you can do individual ones for most (but not all) of these stories. Some people care about their book count; others couldn't care less; I am somewhere in between these two groups.

The first story is "Leopard" (2009) by Jay Lake. This highly talented author died too early in a a very public, drawn-out death that's extremely sad. Much has been written about it available on the Internet. This particular story he wrote is a freebie that features on publisher Baen's site here: https://www.baen.com/Chapters/1932093.... Like many short stories, this one feels like it was taken from a longer, more interesting work. It's an okay snippet, but a strange choice for introducing an anthology. This three-star story didn't hook this reader by any means.

The next story is "Gabriel-Ernest" (1909) by Saki. I gave it four stars and reviewed it here: https://www.goodreads.com/review/show....

The next story, "Sympathy for Wolves" (1998) is by John Gregory Betancourt. He is the anthology's editor; so it's no surprise one of his stories would feature. This is probably the anthology's shortest story. Nevertheless, I really enjoyed it, four stars, and wish it hadn't ended so abruptly. It sets a werewolf world up beautifully.

The next story is The Drone (1934) otherwise known as The Drone, by A. Merritt, or, if you prefer the fuller author name version he seldom actually used, Abraham Grace Merritt. This story is listed individually and I reviewed it here: https://www.goodreads.com/review/show....

The fifth story is The Were-Wolf (1899) by Clemence Housman. This is one of the earliest werewolf stories told. This novelette is the author's first published narrative work and considered her best. It's an allegory for the Christ story. How you mix that with werewolves is really, really odd, but Housman managed it somehow. My four star review is here: https://www.goodreads.com/review/show....

The sixth story is "And Bob's Your Uncle" (2010) by Chelsea Quinn Yarbro. It's a wonderful urban fantasy take on the werewolf story featuring a ten-year-old boy who has to take matters regarding his precarious domestic situation into his own hands since his mother won't. Five stars.

The seventh story is Rudyard Kipling's The Mark of the Beast (1890). My review of this three-star classic can be found here: https://www.goodreads.com/review/show....

The eighth story was an unexpectedly wonderful surprise: "Dumpster Diving" (1995) by Nina Kiriki Hoffman. It starts thus: "Claire wished she liked puppies. When she found the little creature clawing blindly in the dumpster out back of her building, she felt sorry for it, abandoned there so young, before its eyes were even open, and without a winter coat." Drawn in yet? I was. What happened to that puppy made for a great story.

The ninth story is The Werewolf (1911) by Eugene Field. This is another early werewolf classic in the field of our beloved literature. Many liked this story more than I did: https://www.goodreads.com/review/show....

The tenth story is The Wolf (1884) by Guy de Maupassant and was not one of my favorites: https://www.goodreads.com/review/show....

That brings us to the eleventh and longest story in the anthology, a novella: Wolves of Darkness by Jack Williamson. It was the title story in the less well known rival to Weird Tales, the pulp magazine titled Strange Tales of Mystery and Terror, the January 1932 issue to be exact. I am about halfway through this and really enjoying it so far. The protagonist narrator has been called out to a remote part of Texas only to find his brother is part of a werewolf colony that is marauding the locals. What would you do if you found yourself in this situation? Help the locals or join the werewolves? That is the question this story poses.

I just finished the thoroughly enjoyable, long novella Wolves of Darkness. Four star review here: https://www.goodreads.com/review/show....

This is the 11th of the 22 stories in the anthology. One would think one would be halfway through, right? Nope. We are only 33% of the way through the book, and this 11th story was almost as long as the first 10 combined. The longer stories in the anthology are definitely backloaded, which is fine with me. The first 11 stories were all high quality. I imagine the next 11 will be too, and now we will get to spend more time in the stories with the characters created.