Shapeshifter | 
| Author: J. F. Gonzalez
Publisher: Leisure Books
Category: Book
List Price: $7.99
Buy New: $3.00
You Save: $4.99 (62%)
New (23) Used (15) from $2.27
Rating:  7 reviews
Sales Rank: 513628
Media: Mass Market Paperback
Number Of Items: 1
Pages: 323
Shipping Weight (lbs): 0.3
Dimensions (in): 6.7 x 4.2 x 1
ISBN: 0843959738
Dewey Decimal Number: 813.6
EAN: 9780843959734
ASIN: 0843959738
Publication Date: September 10, 2008
Availability: Usually ships in 1-2 business days
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Product Description
Mark Wiseman has been living with the curse for years. He thought he had it under control. He thought he had kept it secret from everybody. Until Bernard Roberts, a powerful, influential man, came into his life. Bernard knows about the curse that runs through Mark's veins. He knows how Mark's parents were killed eight years ago. He knows Mark was officially cleared in their deaths, but is holding the card that could cast Mark as a serious suspect in their murders. And if Mark wants Bernard to keep these things secret he must do what Bernard tells him. He must use his curse to kill. For Mark is a Shapeshifter, a werewolf, who must yield to the primal instinct buried deep within him on every lunar cycle...
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| Customer Reviews: Read 2 more reviews...
 Buy this book...If you're having trouble sleeping August 31, 2008
This book was no good. By the end of the first chapter I didn't care about it. But I stuck it out. I thought it might get better. But it didn't. The last hundred pages took me a week to read because I just didn't care what happened to these lame characters. Then after I finished (even though I thought I couldn't care less how this book ended) I was disappointed in the ending.
More Crime Thriller Than Horror June 25, 2008
While I usually love books by Gonzalez, this one was a step down for me. The opening setup was quite excellent by having a troubled man's identity secretly discovered by his superior at work and recorded on videotape. The boss then blackmails his employee to do his dirty deeds as a werewolf, killing off his competition. However, in almost every scene with the werewolf, you could easily substitute the name "werewolf" for "hitman" and you'd essentially have the same effect, only with a more grisly outcome. It reads more as a crime thriller than a horror novel. I wanted to delve into Mark Wiseman's world a lot deeper than was written, but it was a fast, fun read nonetheless.
My only other problem was the incredibly high amount of coincidences in the final third of the book where our villain discovers his ex-girlfriend and our hero, Mark Wiseman, have been seeing each other, run off together, and are easily tracked down. George Fielding's piecing together clues to the murders and the involvement of everyone also seemed like a bit of a stretch, especially after just coming out of a coma. But regardless, Gonzalez is trying a something new here and I'm glad he did. Personally, I prefer his book, "Survivor", a much more visceral plunge into horror. As long as you have the stomach for it.
Fast read, entertaining, but not brilliant April 7, 2008
This was my first Gonzalez book, and I have to admit that my opinion of it is slightly perplexed. I enjoyed the story; being a sucker for werewolves I was pretty happy to be reading a werewolf book to begin with. The lead character - Mark Weisman, was your standard werewolf, a tragic figure who fights to control his cursed life and deal with the carnage he knows he is causing. He has some control over his change, but not nearly enough.
The real monster of the story is a high level executive, under the gun for committing fraud and a few other nasty white collar crimes. Bernard discovers Mark's secret and decides as only a true monster could, to use it for his own gain. (By the way there are no spoilers in that little bit, it's written on the back of the book). Add in a love interest, quite a few dead execs and a corporate merger and we should be in for quite the evening of werewolf fun.
So why did I finish this 300+ page book in 3 hours? I know I read fast, but it should have lasted me a day and a half... The writing style was very simple, I don't know if that was good or bad. The characters are extremely quick in their emotions, falling in love is an almost overnight decision... there is very little sense of time passing; I know that this book took place in about a years time, but you never get that feeling. Also there are a couple of plot holes that I won't point out here, they aren't huge, but they are there. On the whole I enjoyed the 3 hours I spent blazing through this book. As I said the writing style is extremely simplistic. If it wasn't for the sex and hint at gore (I didn't find the book overly gorey, personally) I would almost consider this written in a "young adult" fashion. There isn't a lot of glowing prose, description is minimal, in fact it isn't until the end of the book that Mark is truly described physically, Bernard is only described as "Tall" and Mark in his wolf shape is left so open that I wasn't sure if we had an "American Werewolf" style or "Lon Chaney" style werewolf. In fact the only characters who are given decent physical descriptions are the women, and that is simply that they are all blond and all have perfect legs and huge boobs.
If you are looking for a fast simple read, pick this up at a used bookstore. If you are looking for something mind altering, mood changing, or eye opening... look elsewhere.
Awful! March 28, 2008
0 out of 2 found this review helpful
Hey, I love a good, cheesy horror novel as much as the next guy (or ghoul) but this one isn't. It stinks. Very amateur writing, implausible plot, weak characters, meaningless gore - there's nothing at all worth reading here. You have to wonder why Leisure chose to re-print this dated, sub-par wolfman story in the first place. In fact, the entire Leisure line of horror has taken a downward turn with no less than THREE werewolf novels being published in the last three months.Give me a Richard Laymon psycho anyday! (Although, Leisure's recent release of Laymon's Cuts was so full of editorial errors that it almost rendered Laymon's work unreadable.) Get your act together, Leisure!
 Viva Lycanthropes January 16, 2008
1 out of 2 found this review helpful
I'm a sucker for a good old fashioned werewolf story, and this one from J. F. Gonzalez satisfies. It's fun, fast-paced and wonderuflly vicious. Grab this one and kick back for a really good fang and claw story.
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