Status Updates From Werewolf Short Stories

Capes, "The Thing in the Forest": short, slightly trite, a product of its times and mores. It did hold an interesting bit of werewolf lore unknown to me.

Campbell, Ramsey, "The Change": meh. Horrific enough, but when I find myself flipping pages to see how much more of the story there is, it's lost me. Psychological terror.

Campbell, Gilbert, "The White Wolf of Kostopchin": a wonderful (though predictable) Russian werewolf tale from the late 1800s. Terrific imagery and atmosphere, thrilling tension, enjoyable resolution.

Boober, "The Claws come Out": meh. Good premise, great setting, poorly told (or badly edited) with disjointed sequences that made little sense.

Bond, "Moonskin": clever, eloquently told, and told in such a manner I expected it to be an older story reprinted. It is not - it is a brand new tale from a modern writer. Well done.

Blackwood, "The Camp of the Dog": once upon a time this style of storytelling was in vogue. Ugh. I probably would have liked this as a youth, as I read lots of similar. Now it's too antique, too rigid, too silly. A lot of hubbub about so very little, with an outcome none today would write because none today would want it.

Beauchamp, "The Cull": First of the modern authors stories, decent point of view from the werewolves perspective in modern times. Reminiscent of *The Village* movie in several ways.

Ball, "The Werewolf Howls": now this is a terrific story. For those read in such matters it is predictable, but it is so well written it does not matter.

Cossack Folktale, "The Iron Wolf": I do not get the lesson here. The Iron Wolf is supposedly the Slavic god Veles. Essentially, it's a sell your soul to the devil type deal. However, this time our protagonist not only escapes his due he actually destroys his devil (god). Odd.