synopsis

Wolfheart

Synopsis

The book is about Alexander, a 19 year old high-school drop out in Reykjavík. His life takes an unexpected turn when he meets and falls in love a 17 year old girl, Védís. Everything becomes more complicated when he notices changes in his body after a night he can not remember. He wakes up in a strange place and is met there by a group of men who claim that he is a werewolf – like them. Now, everything happens quickly and his unexciting life as a coke-truck driver gets full of unexpected events.

Alexander – 19 years old. He has brown eyes, dark-brown shoulder-lenght hair. Broad jaws and shoulders, narrow waist. He has silver rings in his ears and long, old-fashioned side-burns. He had a difficult childhood and now rents an small apartment where he lives alone. He left school in order to afford the rent and is working on a coca-cola truck, driving out soft drinks to super-markets. He listens to new-wave rock and heavy metal and likes kung-fu movies. He has hot temper and sometimes he gets aggressive, but not violent. He has a great character, a very likeable person, but become easily angry and irritated. He joggs and works out, but also smokes. With time, you come to learn that he is a werewolf.

Védís – 17 years, the younger sister of Alexander’s best friend, Billi. She is tall and slim, has light brown eyes and black long hair. She likes Alexander and he likes her – two loners who find each other. She had a good upbringing, however, her parents divorced and Billi is only her half-brother. She usually dresses in black and likes rock music. She’s tough and independent and does not have many friends and sometimes feels lonely. Towards the end of the book we learn that she and her biological father (Saemundur) are both werewolfs. In the book, Védís has many of the best and humorous scenes, like when her mother has a chat with her about ”the birds and the bees” and when she snaps into a cool revenge-mode when confronted by an middle aged kiosk-owner when she tries to buy sigarettes (under age).

Saemundur – He is about forty years old, dressed in black and has dark eyes. He has dark long hair that is a little gray and a beard to match. He is a member of Werewolves Anonymous (WA) and therefore a werewolf. WA is a support group for werewolves who want to lead a peace full and normal life in modern society – like the AA is for alcoholics. Saemundur is one of the five men that capture Alexander when he transformes into a werewolf for the first time and he is the one who explains everything to him – tells him the long story of WA and the pros and cons af being an werewolf and about life as a ”passive” werewolf. He is very patient and kind to Alexander – like the father he never really had. He wants to help him to live a good life without violence and to accept the animal within. Saemundur committed a murder before he became a member of WA but changed his life and is now a easy going and happy person. He owns a dog hotel.

Rúnar – age 27. He is a criminal and also a werewolf. He is big and strong, has thick sideburns, black hair and thick eyebrows. He has been in jail often and uses his werewolf-powers to achieve success in the underworld. He deals with drugs and weapons, and he lives a dishonest life. He is very tough, violent and dangerous – but charming in a bad-boy syndrome kinda way.

The story begins in Reykjavik, the year 2012. We get to know Alexander. He does not like his job and hates his co-worker. Alexander gets irritated and is rude to a female employee at a fast-food restaurant for forgetting to remove the cheese from his hamburger. He likes to jog and notices one day that his stamina is very good – he can run far and fast without getting tired. He also comes to realise that his sight and hearing is exceptionally good. He has a friend named Billi. They have known each other since elementary school. Now they do not meet that often. Alexander feels he does not belong with his old friends. But Alexander has invited Védís, Billi’s kid sister to the movies. He likes her and looks forward to the evening. When he has picked her up and they are going into the cinema they meet three tough-guys that harass Védís verbally. Alexander confronts the gang and the leader, a drug dealer called Fat-Eddi, hits him in the stomach. Védís and Alexander go instead to his apartment where they spend the night together. When he wakes up, she’s gone.

The next evening Alexander goes to a party with his friend Billi and some other pals. They play The werewolf party game. Billi is angry with him because he slept with his sister. Alexander drinks too much and gets really hammered. He begins to change into a werewolf and attacks three young men. Suddenly five dark men attack Alexander and he loses consciousness. He wakes up in an unknown room, starpped onto the bed. It turns out that he is in the headquarters of WA. Two of the five men are Icelandic, and one of them is called Saemundur. They explain to Alexander that he is a werewolf. Alexander is swollen and in a lot of pain but does not believe what they are saying. Saemundur says that WA is an ancient group that helps young werewolves to understand their identity and to live a normal life. Saemundur gives Alexander a ride home and asks him to call if he wants help.

Later it turns out that the three guys Alexander attacked where Billi and two of his buddies. Alexander feels really bad about this. But he again loses his temper when his co-worker irritates him. Alexander attacks him and loses his job. He hits rock bottom and calls Saemundur and they meet again. Saemundur explains in detail what it is to be werewolf, how you become one and what the group does and tells him also about his own life.

In the middle of the book is a werewolf tale that takes place in Norway in the year 1200. A traveller and a local woman are killed by a local werewolf.

Védís not feeling well. Alexander has not made contact and she is depressed. She gets into trouble at school, in gym class, when she throws a basketball hard into the face of another girl. Her old friends are trying to get her spirits up but she gets irritated. She feels alone.

One evening Alexander goes with WA to Litla-Hraun prison. A werewolf is to be released and they want to talk to him – get him straight. He is called Rúnar and is a criminal who used to be a big shot in the underworld. On the way Alexander learns that werewolves can communcate mind to mind, without uttering a word – telepathy. Three other men are also waiting outside the prison, some other criminals and drug dealers – friends of Rúnar. WA make them leave and when Rúnar comes out they try to talk to him. He goes with them but says he wants to continue to live his life as before. The day after Saemundur asks Alexander to visit Rúnar to persuade him. He believes that Alexander can do it because he is young and not one of the old boring werewolves. Alexander is hesitates, but does it anyway.

He visits Rúnar and they drive around in Alexanders pickup – doing small errands. Rúnar talks about being a FREE werewolf and not trying to be anything else – not a wolf in a cage. He has a completely different view on how to deal with being a werewolf, and he also shows Alexander some cool tricks, like controlling dogs with telepathy and pushing people from a distance using only the air between them – like magic. Downtown Alexander sees Védís talking to Fat-Eddi and thinks maybe they are dating. The readers learns that Fat-Eddi was harassing Védís. In the evening Alexander and Rúnar are at Rúnar’s place – Rúnar smoking pot and talking, Alexander listening, to afraid to leave. Then someone shoots at the house – smashing the windows. Rúnar thinks it was someone from his competitor – Fat-Eddi.

The next day Alexander learns that Fat-Eddi is a rapist. Rúnar wants to meet Fat-Eddi the day after, for a show-down – does Alexander want to back him up? Alexander says he has nothing to lose and accepts. Alexander buys as axe to bring to the showdown and runs into Védís outside the hardware store. He tries to hide the axe and flees into his car when Védís tries to confront him.

That night Fat-Eddi kidnaps Védís but Alexander and Rúnar spend the night in a club in downtown where they drink a lot and Rúnar says he was sodomized when he was 12 and since then his life has been violent and out of control. Alexander thinks that Fat-Eddi once raped Védís. They ask Fat-Eddi to meet them after dark the next day in a clearing in a wood near Reykjavík. Before they go to the showdown Rúnars asks Alexander to eat some pills. They walk through the forrest and Alexander sees that Rúnar is gloomy, like he has something heavy on his mind. Fat-Eddi is waiting, with two armed friends, and Alexander finds out that Rúnar has made a pact with Fat-Eddi, who ties Alexanders hands and takes him into the clearing. There Saemundur is waiting, all gray and anxious.

The deal is this: Fat-Eddi and Rúnar want Saemundur to make WA stop interfering with the underworld – if he says no they will shoot Alexander. Saemundur says that he alone can not stop WA. Fat-Eddi then brings Védís into the clearing, tight up like Alexander. They talk together, mind to mind – two young lovers in despair. Fat-Eddi tells Saemundur that the man he once killed was his father – Fat-Eddi is crazy with hate and threatens to rape or kill Védís.

Alexander tries to change into an werewolf but the pills he took were betablockers – a drug that suppresses the animal within. When Rúnar gets enough of Fat-Eddi’s craziness Fat-Eddi shoots him. Then Saemundur goes into changing, Fat-Eddi is going to shoot him next but Rúnar manages to change into a werewolf and jumps in the line of fire. Saemundur becomes a grey wolf and chases Fat-Eddi into the woods, where he suffers a heart-attack but lives. Alexanders gets knocked out. WA come to rescue Saemundur and the cops arrest Fat-Eddi for murder.

Alexander wakes up in his apartment and there is Védís, nursing him. The book ends with a chapter of Alexander and Védís climbing a mountain together and you get to know that she is a werewolf and have known it since she was 13. In the end they sit happily together at the top of the mountain – watching the full moon.