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Like a packed subway car, this humorous and entertaining werewolf novel rattles through the bowels of an unnamed city disgorging and picking up characters as it goes. Annie, a legal secretary and the nicest person you'd ever want to meet, discovers she suffers from LMD (Lycanthropic Metamorphic Disorder), which turns her into a werewolf on full moons and gives her an uncontrollable urge to rip out the throats of deserving evil-doers, including several arms merchants and corporate power-mongers. Annie is taken in (in more ways than one) by Dr. Marco Potenza, who runs a secret facility for recovering werewolves. But she also breaks the rules and falls in love with a renegade werewolf named Jim. Meanwhile Marco's wife and father, Annie's weird friends, the mayor of the city, and a sweet simpleton of a news reporter are all converging on the night of the harvest moon.
Sparkle Hayter knows how to keep the plot galloping along like a werewolf in heat, and somehow makes the ridiculous strangely believable. Unexpected twists and turns concerning various adulterous affairs (who's "canoodling" whom?) keep it edgy and bubbling. On top of it all, Hayter, as fans of her outrageous Robin Hudson mystery series know, can be very funny. When Annie's friend Liz, a high-end caterer, mixes up two party orders, "the Orthodox Jews with drug problems got ham and cheese and shrimp salad and the gay cops got the kosher platter." --Mark Frutkin
From Publishers Weekly
Fans of Hayter's wild Robin Hudson mystery series (The Last Manly Man) may be surprised by Annie Engel, Manhattan legal secretary by day, werewolf by night. Unlike sleuthing hipster Robin, 20-something Annie is clueless and not half as entertaining as the supporting cast and clever plot in this witty but uneven supernatural mystery. She leads a self-declared boring life, mourning a lost romance and working for the monolithic Synergy Enterprises. Boring, that is, if you don't count her turning into a werewolf at night and committing mayhem, including the murder of a Synergy executive (her lupine nose catches a whiff of his rotten soul). Annie isn't aware of her nocturnal exploits, but the city is buzzing about the strange serial murders, and soon several people are trailing her. One of them is the comically inept Sam Deverell, an over-the-hill former TV anchor now working as a Citywide Cable News overnight reporter ("the newsroom equivalent of an ice floe"). Another is Dr. Marco Potenza, head of the underground Center for Lycanthropic Metamorphic Disorder, dedicated to helping "people living with LMD." As a psychiatrist from a long line of werewolves who've mastered the art of controlling their urges via drugs and hypnotherapy, Potenza wants to rehabilitate Annie. But his former assistant and enemy, Jim Valiente (now a "free werewolf" indulging his wild side), is determined to keep Annie far from Potenza's clutches. The madcap antics make this book a pleasure, though readers will wish that the passive Annie had a more forceful role. Hayter's writing is sharp, but she needs a stronger heroine for the book to really howl.
Copyright 2003 Reed Business Information, Inc.
--This text refers to the
Paperback
edition.
