The Last Werewolf

This book came out in the wake of the Twilight phenomenon, and Glen Duncan seems determined to ensure that the reader understands that this is not That Sort Of Werewolf Book. Oh no, this is an Edgy Werewolf Book. There is graphic violence, there is a lot of sex, there are a lot of c-bombs thrown around (also, if I don't have to read the word “sly” in conjunction with a c-bomb again it will be too soon). It does do some cool things! The world-building is excellent, Duncan creates an intriguing shadow world in which werewolves are no longer able to transmit their condition through bites, and a religious-turned-paramilitary organization that hunts them down (hence why there's a last werewolf in the first place). But where it fails spectacularly is character development. Jake Marlowe, the titular final lycanthrope, spends most of the first 150 pages of the book despairing at his status in the world and preparing for his own death. It really does not make for a compelling reading experience. The character beats that are hit are largely very similar throughout the book, until a second main character is introduced about halfway through, when Marlowe gets a second set of beats to hit, though this character remains at a remove despite a lot of words being used to describe them. And that's the other thing. The prose, while not terrible by any means, tends towards the overwritten and this does not do anything to make it more dynamic. Some books I read quickly because I can't stop turning the pages, and some I read quickly because I want to get on to the next thing and this was the latter.