Most people, if they read, get off on books that incarnate into movies, video games, Fruit Roll-Ups, and toothpaste. Of course, the little demon of intellectual affirmative action sits on my shoulder and says “Don’t over-generalize; they’re not all as bad as you’re implying!” Sure, I want to let my South Park conservativism kick into gear by shoving his pitchfork up his ass. However, I really can’t help the camera from dramatically zooming up to my eyes as I whisper, “Such is true. Touche, my dear man.” After all, the bad-assity of Indiana Jones will never be tainted by all the cereal toys they’ve made of him. But in spite of this, I’m still pretty pissed off at humanity’s tendency to read cheap things and then cheapen them further. And to me, “At least they’re reading” has lost its power as an excuse.
Don’t worry; I have indeed chilled out and have gotten off my literary high horse. However, I’m not going any lower than the pony I’m on now. While I’ll always be an Indy fan, I’m also a fan of D.H. Lawrence and Jorge Luis Borges. And although those two gentlemen cannot steal Sankara Stones and liberate all the children of an entire third world country, they also have produced great writing that is booby-trapped against being incarnated into Saturday morning cartoons or granola bars. This is commendable, although I can’t help but ask, “Why can’t there be some kind of balance between Indiana Jones and John mother-fucking Milton? Between Teen Wolf and… you know… something that’s kind of not stupid?”
Well, you’re in luck if you’re reading this, because I’m going to introduce you to some werewolf / monster stories that have not only achieved this balance, but have done so while avoiding anything remotely Twilight-esque in nature. This means that the protagonists won’t sparkle inexplicably, faint or fall down when aroused, or generally act like Hot Topic employees.