Arena of the Wolf, by Jim Gavin

Today’s horror writers are faced with a dilemma from the moment they start typing. The world is fast paced and internet-quick, and a story takes some time to tell. The average reader’s attention span is in the low ten seconds area and the editor or publisher that the writer is trying to reach before the general public has thirty other manuscripts to read before he gets to ours.

So now the writer’s group I belong to tells me all novels should be about 80,000 words or less. I have always preferred taking my time, whether I’m trying to romance a femme-female or tell a story. It just works better for me.

With that concept in mind, I approach each new novel that I read with the understanding that not everyone is like me and the trend today is to tell the story quick, get to the blood-letting by page two or paragraph three and have someone die quickly to keep the reader’s interest. I get it.

Jim Gavin’s Arena of the Wolf is a werewolf story of a different slant, albeit told in the vein of the quicker the better. It’s a relatively short novella-length story centered around a truck-driving werewolf who becomes part of a traveling rodeo show where he gets more money for staging the deaths of the riders he has to carry. The more he makes the crowd love the carnage the better for his pocket. Until he gets fed up with the whole show and his boss and turns the tables on everyone involved.

I have always liked werewolf stories and liked the different slant this one had with the rodeo scenes being well played out. The only trouble I had was that the first third of the book is told in first person and the remainder of the book is told in third person. Although it is explained, it made the shift hard for me to follow and the voice of the storyteller a little bit odd. I had to reread some parts a couple of times to get the feel.

All in all, if you want a quick story with good action and a new slant, check this one out.