The Shape-Changer's Wife

I loved this book! I didn't expect much when I first started reading it on a short flight home. It's a slim volume, and the language seemed old-fashioned, the plot slow moving. All of that is true, and yet I found myself instantly captivated and I couldn't put it down. I finished the book in record time, and when I turned the last page I was grinning broadly and wiping away a tear. If that's not a sign of a fabulous book, I don't know what is!

I was particularly taken with Shinn's characterization in this novel. Lilith is fascinating, if hard to like (on purpose), and while Glyrenden comes across as somewhat stereotypically evil, I really liked Aubrey, Orion, Arachne, Eve, and many of the other characters. I also really liked the show more author's use of magic. The shape-shifting aspect isn't terribly unusual, but combining it with transmutation made it fascinating.

The romance angle, as well, is incredibly well done. Not saccharine or over-the-top, just very... lovely. Overall, a wonderful book from a fabulous fantasy writer. I really enjoyed her Semaria Trilogy, and I look forward to reading other books by her. show less

I *thought* this book was part of the same series as 'The Truth-Teller's Tale' and 'The Safe-Keeper's Secret.' (I dunno, something about the title?)
Anyway, it's not. Although I loved those other 2 books, I think I liked this one even more than either. I was surprised to read here that it was actually Shinn's first novel, because it didn't read like a freshman effort at all. The language was gorgeous, and the plot flowed smoothly and beautifully.

A young apprentice wizard is sent by his master to study with the famed wizard Glyrenden. Glyrenden has a mixed reputation, at best, but he's also powerful and knowledgable - and the only adept to have mastered the art of shapechanging. However, he's also odd and prickly - and his household is show more even odder, consisting of his beautiful but strange wife, and two peculiar servants, one of whom is mute and the other of whom seems to have some kind of OCD disorder. Left alone with her at length, the young man finds himself drawn to his new teacher's wife like a moth to a flame...

This isn't one of those stories where the secrets are revealed to much shock and surprise. Rather, it's a fairytale where everything unfolds just as it ought to. It's a lovely, satisfying story.

Recommended for fans of Patricia McKillip, as well as Shinn's own fans, of course. show less

While apprenticed to a malicious wizard, Aubrey falls in love with his master's wife and learns her horrifying secret.

A love story wrapped in an allegory of domestic abuse inside a faerie tale -- but it doesn't entirely work on any of its levels. The love story is essentially composed of Aubrey telling himself that he's in love; the allegory never allows any action from the victims; the faerie tale has nice moments but never sustains a distinct tone. And Aubrey himself is a opaque protagonist: he must verbally articulate his epiphanies lest the audience miss his character growth. The Shape-Changer's Wife is ultimately pleasant but inconsequential.

The settings are not fully realized, nor are the inner-lives of the main characters (who are more or less vehicles for the plot which is one of unfolding awareness and reaction), yet the pages keep turning and the story keeps moving on and the reader is rewarded.

As YA, this story is likely a good one for learning how to read archetypes and discover literary devices, it is a very unapologetic, baldfaced, straightforward fantasy read. The structure is perfect, the plot unfolds methodically making reading the book like driving a familiar winding road for experienced readers or a great first curvy, hilly road for fantasy readers just getting started. This book will reward them both with a destination worth reaching.

A young wizard, Aubrey, is apprenticed to a master shape changer, but gradually comes to see shape of things for himself.

The mystery here is a bit more serpentine that in the Treasure, but this is also a perfect book to greet spring.

There’s an insidious pull to the shapechanger, Glyrenden’s evil. The subtle horror of forcing things from their natural design. Imposing one’s will on the heart of things for amusement.

Aubrey’s journey into becoming himself and learning the price of knowledge is exactly what I would expect from Shinn. Complex, luminous, brilliant.

Aubrey is a gifted young student of wizardry who leaves his first teacher, Cyril, who refuses to teach him the "barbaric" art of shape-changing, to study with Glyrenden, a feared and reviled wizard with no scruples. Aubrey, a sociable and kindly man, immediately feels out of place in Glyrenden's strange home, which is also inhabited by Glyrenden's wife Lilith and two servants, all of them distinctly odd. As the novel progresses, Aubrey's feelings of indifference to Lilith change into obsession, his powers grow faster than even Glyrenden can imagine, and he is tempted by the power that has become his.

I really liked this. I know it has some negative reviews, but I think maybe those readers went in with mistaken impressions.

Yes, I guessed the 'twist' as soon as the scene was set, but that's not a problem. The story (novella, really, as it's so short) is worth reading for the different characters, the metaphorical journeys they go on, the world-building & magic system, and the ending.

I do have to mention that there is a trigger of offstage pedophilia.