Our Werewolves Are Different / Literature

Types of werewolves in literature.

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• 100% Wolf has werewolves coming in two different types. The Fangen, who are capable of transformation, and the Weren, who are born from werewolves but don't have the transformation ability due to being mostly human. Fangen don't get the ability to transform until their one hundred-and-twenty first month (ten years and one month). The main focus of the book is that the protagonist's first transformation doesn't go well as it turns out he's a were-poodle instead (strongly implied to be due to his mother getting bitten by a poodle while pregnant).

A

• Age of Steam: In Dead Iron, Cedar (under a curse) changes by the full moon and loses his mind, requiring him to chain himself. He pays quite dearly for a collar that lets him keep his right mind. We later learn that his brother Wil is still alive and also under a curse, but while Cedar only changes during the full moon, Wil is permanently a wolf — fortunately, he can control himself all the time when not actively bespelled by LeFel.
• The main character of Alfie the Werewolf becomes a werewolf because it runs in his family but skips a generation (his grandfather is also a werewolf, but his parents are not). They can however turn other people into werewolves by biting them, and the 13th book introduces special belts which can temporarily turn people into werewolves. Werewolves in these books can both walk on four legs like a normal wolf or on two like a Wolf Man. They are not bloodthirsty monsters but most of the time retain their human minds and ability to speak, although sometimes they can get so-called werewolf hunger, which they can solve by eating meat. While young werewolves only transform during the full moon, older werewolves like Alfie's grandfather can stay in wolf form all the time.
• Almost Night has a pack of werewolves. They are capable of turning into beast man variety, though they can run on all fours. They are strong enough to carry someone on their back through a forest and rip a vampire to pieces. They are also much better swimmers than humans. Enhanced senses are retained in human form. Silver is apparently not necessary to kill them, since one died after being impaled on a large rock. Unlike vampires, they are not animated by Black Magic, and thus are not inherently evil.
• Anita Blake includes many werebeasts, including werewolves, one of which is one of Anita's love interests, Richard. There's a vaccine for the infection; Richard caught lycanthropy from a bad batch of the serum. Anita herself is currently a carrier (which should be impossible) for multiple strains (which should also be impossible) of the virus.
• The Areas of My Expertise includes handy lycanthropic transformation timetables, showing how and when different kinds of werewolves transform, and how to stop them, during each phase of the moon.
• One of the first forms picked up by the Animorphs is wolves, with some obligatory werewolf jokes.

B

• In Tom Holt's Barking, theriomorphy is transmitted in the classic style, and werewolves gain nigh-invulnerability in both human and wolf forms, including a massively extended lifespan, and most of the werewolf characters work for the same law firm, Ferris and Loop (a Meaningful Name, referencing "Fenris" and "Lupine"). They are rivals of the vampire firm Crosswoods.
• The Bartimaeus Trilogy heavily implies, and then outright states, that the police of the oppressive magical regime that rules the Alternate Universe British Empire are werewolves. Werewolves are the result of exposing humans to transformation spells invented in ancient times. They can transform at will from human form to a giant wolf and anything in between. They are stronger, larger and hardier than humans, but extremely vulnerable to silver and specialized forms of magic and seem to be fairly simple-minded. Their human forms are noticeably tall and bulky, and they seem to be predominately male. It is apparently possible to be a werewolf and a magician, but only one example has been seen. They can be killed by mundane means, however. One dies from leaping out of a high-up window.
• The Belgariad has Poledra, a natural wolf who learns sorcery, giving her the ability to shapeshift into a human woman. Belgarath meets her after he tries his hand at shapeshifting (in the early days of magic, when the sorcerors had to find out everything by themselves), and settles on the shape of the wolf as his favorite. After they eventually marry, Belgarath spends a lot of his time in wolf form and starts to consider it as natural as his human form. Belgarion, the series' main character, has the time of his life when he gets invited by Poledra to try it too.
• Bisclavret: For unknown reasons, Bisclavret must transform into a wolf every week. His wife steals his clothing, without which he can't change back, but one day, the king his friend goes hunting in the woods. Bisclavret jumps at him and paws his foot like a petitioner, and the king, impressed, grants the wolf his life. Then Bisclavret goes with the hunting party and stays at court. Everyone is so impressed by his nobility and gentleness that when his wife and her new husband appear at court, and he attacks them, the king concludes that they must have wronged the wolf and imprisons them until they confess. With his clothing back, Bisclavret can return to human form. Similarly, in a lai featuring King Arthur, Melion, the wife actively transforms the husband into a wolf, but he again takes refuge in court and attacks his wife there, leading to his transformation back.
• The Black Company mentions a few, but in action participates only Forvalaka — were-leopards. Undead were-leopards. Vicious, superhumanly fast and almost unkillable.
• The Black Douglas: Assuming they're real at all, they can apparently transform at will and have a psychic link to each other and their master.
• The werewolves in Blood and Chocolate (1997) are of the genetic variety and can only breed with other werewolves. They turn into something like a dire wolf, but Vivian notes they had only adopted wolf as a convenient term and are truly known as the Loup-Garoux. They can transform at will, but transform involuntarily at the full moon, and are weak to silver in any form. They keep their minds when transformed, however, and are expressly forbidden to be seen by or kill humans, in order to maintain the Masquerade. They live in packs, with males fighting to be alpha, and females fighting to be the alpha's mate.
• In Blood Books, specifically Blood Trail, we meet a family of werewolves. Like real wolves, they are an extended family group who live on a well-defined territory, in this case the family farm. Their canid form resembles a large mixed-breed dog more than a pure wolf. They can transform at will and tend to wear minimal clothing which can be shucked off at the drop of a hat (any hat), and have thus gained a reputation among neighbors as secretive nudists. The book does an excellent job of giving them many psychological traits which match canid behavior, and the series' regular protagonists at times find it quite frustrating trying to get them to even temporarily give up their canid behaviors, even when their lives depend on it. They don't transmit lycanthropy through bites either. Henry explains to Vicki that humans turning into werewolves is a myth; if a werewolf bites a person, they'll bleed, but they won't turn into a werewolf themselves.
• Two different types of werewolf show up in Blood Red, and two others are referred to. All of them are apparently vulnerable to silver and wolfsbane.
  • Sorcerers can use Blood Magic and a wolfskin belt to become werewolves. They have superhuman strength and a hybrid man-wolf form, plus enhanced healing. They have to cast the shifter spell each time they take wolf form, but apparently can return to human form without another Human Sacrifice.
  • Members of the werewolf bloodlines gain the ability to turn into wolves after they're weaned. They retain the same body mass whether wolf or human (youngsters turn into wolf cubs), their human intellect, and normal strength. If they spend too long in wolf form, they can lose themselves in the wolf's instincts. Their change is completely voluntary and can take place at any time as long as the werewolf isn't in sunlight. They have supernatural healing (which includes healing diseases), but only when in wolf form. Their bite does not create other werewolves.
  • It's possible for someone to be either infected or cursed with lycanthropy. We don't see an example of either on-page, but it's implied that they almost always "go bad" as the human mind loses itself in the wolf instincts as the shift occurs.
• In The Book of Lost Things, Loups are man/wolf hybrids created via women coupling with wolves.
• Bordertown: The protagonist of Elsewhere calls an elf an "Elflands bitch". In retribution, she tries to turn him into a dog, but magic in Bordertown is unreliable, and he becomes a wolf man, with hair, wolf ears, and a snout that makes it impossible for him to speak.
• Bruce Coville's Book of... Spine Tinglers: What's a Little Fur Among Friends? features a line of werewolves who start to change around puberty (but the curse only hits every other generation) and can freely change back and forth as long as the moon is full, though older ones can't change as often as younger ones. They're also allergic to silver.

C

• In Chronicles of the Kencyrath, the Wolvers are inverse werewolves; they are wolves that can transform into human form. Their young cannot achieve the transformation until they reach a certain point in their development. As humans, they are still quite hairy.
• City of Devils — and its sequels, Fifty Feet of Trouble and Wolfman Confidential — features both werewolves (turn into large wolves) and wolfmen (who look like Lon Chaney Jr.). Each side has a long-standing feud that manifests in their chosen career paths. Both serve in law-enforcement, but the werewolves work for the Sheriff's Department while the wolfmen are regular cops.
• In Anthony Boucher's short story "The Compleat Werewolf", certain people possess the ability to turn into werebeasts of various species anytime they want by saying a magic word.^note Simply called The Word by the author, presumably because he doesn't want to reveal it to the reader. They can only ever turn into one type of beast, which may or may not be practical (were-diplodocus, anybody?) and keep your human intelligence — however, being incapable of speech, they need to somehow get somebody else to say the magic change-back word ("absarka") in order to change back. When they do, they're naked.
• Crescent City: Danika can and does effortlessly change between her human and wolf forms, and can communicate well while in wolf form.
• The Wyr in Nick O'Donohoe's Crossroads trilogy (The Magic and the Healing, Under the Healing Sign, and The Healing of Crossroads) are a separate species; they shapeshift at will (although it's painful, physically taxing, and disturbing to watch) and have something of a Healing Factor. While they're generally attractive in human form, they're secretive, brutally pragmatic, rather feral, and arrogant as hell. Despite this, they're basically on the side of good after the first book.
• Cycle of the Werewolf has a more traditional, man-wolf, changes-with-the-moon type. Oddly enough the victim has no idea how he started involuntarily shapeshifting, and initially not even that it is happening. He does remember picking strange flowers in a graveyard before he started having blackouts, which is one of the less known/used methods of lycanthropic infection. Even if he never realized it, readers probably picked it up as a red flag anyway.

D

• There are two breeds of werewolf in Dan Shamble, Zombie P.I., and neither like each other very much: the "Hairballs", who permanently resemble the Wolfman, and the "Monthlies", who become wolf/human hybrids under the full moon. Both varieties' conditions are transmissible to normal humans via biting or scratching, including the trivial sorts suffered in accidents or romantic foreplay; despite this similarity, the third novel in the series is mainly about the rivalry between the two types over who the "real" werewolves are.
• The Arcadian and Katagarian wolf branches of the Were Hunters in The Dark Hunters can change between wolf and human easily and painlessly when conscious and alert. The Arcadians are humans who turn in to an animal and the Katagarians are animals who can take a human form. If injured badly or shocked with electricity they lose control of their shifting. When injured or asleep they change into their base form (human/animal) and when shocked they might shift uncontrollably for a few hours. Electricity is also used to trap a Were Hunter in one form permanently.
• MaryJanice Davidson's werewolves are faster and stronger in their human form and can turn into both Man Wolf and Dire Wolf at will although they have to during the full moon.
• In Department 19, Frankenstein's Monster, of all things, becomes a werewolf after getting attacked by one at the end of the first novel.
• Discworld:
  • Werewolves are a distinct species in their own right and transform between wolf and human forms at will but are unable to keep themselves from changing into wolves during a full moon; a silver collar can also trap them in a single form. To be a werewolf, you need to be born a werewolf; infection by bite is alluded to but never actually demonstrated (in the books; it does happen in Discworld Noir, which Pratchett worked on). Silver and fire are a werewolf's primary weaknesses; all other damage is temporary. During the involuntary moon-induced transformation there's an irresistible urge to eat meat, but enough control is maintained for the werewolf to choose which kind of meat is consumed. They do not, notably, have any particular kinship with regular wolves, which are noted to like werewolves about as much as humans do.
    • Pratchett delves much deeper into the psychology of the werewolf than most writers, describing what the world looks like to a creature that uses smell as its primary sense. The "smell as its primary sense" has to be reinterpreted by the werewolf when in human form; it is presented as synesthesia, with scent data being reinterpreted in terms of colours and sounds. Werewolves have their own distinct culture, complete with werewolf supremacists; most feudal lords in Überwald who aren't vampires are werewolves. There's also an old traditional game where a pack of werewolves chases a human through a forest, with prior agreement and a number of established rules and handicaps on the hunters. If the human evades the werewolves for a set time, he gets dinner and a lot of money; if he's caught, he becomes dinner instead. Modern werewolves still engage in this sport, but with most of the old rules and consent removed.
    • Occasionally, a werewolf is born that cannot change shape, which is called a yennork. This is very explicitly not a human or a wolf, but still a werewolf — just one that is therefore trapped in the body of either a wolf or a human. Yennorks face intense discrimination in werewolf society, and many are forced to flee to live among human societies or wolf packs. While pure-bred werewolves change into normal wolves, interbreeding between yennorks and wolves or humans has a produced a range of other forms, such as humans who turn into wolf men or especially intelligent and cruel wolves.
  • The most notable werewolf character in the books is Delphine Angua von Überwald of the City Watch, whose ability to turn into a creature with a better sense of smell than most bloodhounds proves enormously useful in her line of work. Angua, who's a vegetarian when she can help it, eats chickens during her enforced wolf times (and always leaves behind payment for them, even when forced to steal them from out of the henhouse). Reaper Man features two interesting specimens. One (Mrs. Cake's daughter Ludmilla) is, for three weeks out of the month, a young woman; the other is, three weeks out of the month, pretty much just an intelligent wolf. That fourth week, though, they meet each other halfway, and it's implied that they begin a relationship.
  • Werewolves are generally referred to as undead. Despite uncertainty as to whether they truly should be categorized along with zombies and vampires, the consensus seems to be "they're big and scary, they come from Überwald, and if you stab them with a sword they don't die. What more do you want?" Angua and her family also act rather dog-like — they don't like the B.A.T.H. word or hearing "Vet" (Vimes at one point deliberately pauses saying Lord Vetinari's name just to mess with them), and at one point, Angua laments the difficulty of walking past lamp posts without... well, you know. She also kept squeezing a dog's squeaky toy during a conversation and after she left, had to consciously come back to put it down. This is discussed in the books as a logical progression: Dogs are, essentially, wolves that were given human traits. Werewolves are wolves that are partly human. Her first few books refer to Angua's "wolf" form looking more like a pedigree wolfhound than an actual wolf (her being able to pass as one was a major plot point in Jingo), although this was abandoned by the time her family was introduced.
• The Dream Eaters and Other Stories features the short story Beneath a Crescent Moon, in which, as the title suggests, werewolves are not affected by the phases of the moon.
• The Dresden Files has four varieties. All four are presented in Fool Moon, and Harry has to figure out which one is at large in Chicago. (It's all four at once.^note There's Dirty Cop hexenwolves, who are framing both a loup-garou and a lycanthrope biker gang, plus a good-guy werewolf pack.) Together the four types cover most of the range of possibilities. None are contagious, however, as Bob is at pains to point out.
  "Would you get off this 'bitten and turn into a werewolf' kick, Harry?" Bob said. "It doesn't work that way. Not ever. Or you'd have werewolves overrunning the entire planet in a couple of years."
  • The werewolf (as a technical term) is just a human who can transform into a normal wolf at will. They undergo no mental changes (and thus must learn how to live like a wolf), have no linkage to the Moon, and gain no special invulnerabilities. It is a learned ability, somewhat like becoming a wizard who knows only two spells but knows those two really well. Humans transformed into wolves by someone else's magic are mentioned as a related subversion, and one that violates one of the Laws of Magic, because a person transformed in this way will, over time, lose their human mind and become no different than any normal, non-magic wolf, which is at that point considered to be murder. Aside from the ability to transform into a wolf and back, there's also one other advantage to being able to change shape: using that magic to heal yourself quickly by rapidly shifting between forms. However, it is a very painful process.
  • The hexenwolf ("spell wolf") uses an enchanted belt of wolfskin to transform at will into a dire wolf. In addition to facilitating the actual transformation, the hexenwolf spirit also helps run the wolf body, bypassing the learning curve true werewolves have to deal with. The magic is generally tied to darker, sometimes demonic, forces and causes the hexenwolf to gradually fall deeper and deeper into savagery in both their wolf and human forms.
  • Lycanthropes are people whose minds become wolf-like at full Moons, and who gain increased strength and healing at the same time, but physically remain human. They are related to Viking berserkers.
  • A loup-garou is a human, subject to a powerful curse (which in at least one case was hereditary). Under the full Moon, he transforms into a demonic man-wolf with enormous speed and strength, as well as immunity to injury by virtually any source except inherited silver. The demon takes over all control during this time, with the human personality completely submerged. There is no known cure, and the only spells capable of perfectly restraining them are similar to what one would need to contain an archangel.
  • And just for variety, there's the wolfwere, a wolf that can take human form in the same way as werewolves, and with the same limitations. Bob never mentions them, but Harry meets one in the course of the story.

F

• In Family Bites, lycanthropy is hereditary. Sophia Rivers thinks it can probably be transmitted as well, but no-one she knows has ever tried. The Rivers family, being easy-going and friendly werewolves, are described as looking like large friendly dogs in wolf form. They can change shape whenever they feel like it, although they sometimes do it at full moon without meaning to. A bit of a lampshade is hung on this and Our Vampires Are Different; Sophia Rivers (werewolf) and Daniel Alfonz (half-vampire) look each other up in the mythology books and are completely bewildered by what they find. Then they look themselves up and get even more bewildered.
• Felix Castor defines weres as what happens when a human ghost possesses an animal body. The ghost moves in and redecorates; first timers usually create something that looks like a hunter's worst nightmare, but those with experience can make the body look downright human. It usually maintains some animal qualities, however, and the were can shift back and forth at will. If the ghost is ever exorcised from the were body, it collapses utterly, and the ghost has to go back for another round.
• The Fear Street book Bad Moonlight has a band of werewolves that use hynotism to make the protagonist more susceptible to the moonlight, which turns her into a werewolf.
• Forest Kingdom: Featured in the Hawk & Fisher spinoff series' book 1, they're humanoid when transformed, and can change at any time while the full moon is out. They're also filled with an uncontrollable killing rage during the full moon and heal from any wound not inflicted by silver.

G

• Goosebumps:
  • In Werewolf Skin, werewolves shed their skin during the daytime and can only resume their werewolf form if they put on their skin during the night. Burning the skin while it's unshed will kill the werewolf, while stopping the werewolf from putting on its skin for one night cures it. The Werewolf of Fever Swamp features a more traditional werewolf.
  • "The Werewolf's First Night", a short story from More Tales to Give You Goosebumps, has a boy believing that all the people at his camp are werewolves. It turns out he's the werewolf, and it's the full moon...
  • The werewolves in The Werewolf in the Living Room are given a special tooth necklace that has magical powers.
• In The Graveyard Book, the role of Baloo is taken by a no-nonsense Hound of God named Miss Lupescu, who uses the Baltic version of the myth. As a Hound of God Miss Lupescu, and apparently other werewolves, pursue evil and will run to the gates of hell, or beyond, to save the innocent. She transforms into a powerful wolf and is immune to injury except from silver. She's also apparently immortal.
• The Guardians of Childhood: In the final novel, Jack Frost: The End Becomes the Beginning, Jack befriends a Transylvanian Werewolf King during his travels. Though they have a fearsome reputation, his pack has sworn to protect people from the forces of darkness, having chosen to view their condition as a gift from the Man in the Moon to destroy evil. They take part in the final battle against Pitch's forces.

H

• Half Upon a Time gives us the Wolf King, who can assume a human guise as he wishes.
• In Harry Potter, lycanthropy is transmitted by bites, and results in uncontrolled transformations during a full moon utilising like many, many modern versions the tragedy of The Wolf Man (1941). Werewolves are discriminated against by the Wizarding society despite their relative innocence. They are dangerous to humans, but not to other animals (or Animagi). No cure exists, but a Wolfsbane Potion allows them to keep control of their minds during the transformation. Good werewolf Remus Lupin takes the Wolfsbane potion to keep his, whereas the evil Fenrir Greyback doesn't care as he is bloodthirsty as a human anyway. It should also be noted that werewolves are only created when bitten by another werewolf while in wolf form. If bitten by a werewolf in human form, they may garner a few traits (a desire for bloody meat, a temper issue, etc.), but will not actually become a werewolf. In the books werewolves are Dire Wolves, with only a few superficial differences between them and real wolves. In the movies, they are Wolf Men that look more like were-chihuahuas than wolves. Silver won't harm a werewolf any more than anything else would, but it's indispensable for treating werewolf-inflicted bites when powdered and mixed with dittany. While it can't cure lycanthropy, the mixture allows victims to survive what would otherwise be almost assuredly fatal bites by cleaning and closing the wound when applied promptly, although many wizards would rather die than survive and suffer from the discrimination and fear directed at them.
• In High Moor, werewolves come in both bipedal and quadruped varieties. 'Moonstruck' werewolves turn into uncontrollable beasts when they transform, while normal werewolves have a greater degree of control, and retain their human intellect.
• The Hollows: Werewolves, or Weres, are a separate race that descended from the union of demons and female humans. They can change at will into full wolves, possess enhanced strength and senses even in human form and cannot infect other humans without the help of a demonic curse. They are organized into packs which can vary from hardcore survivalists, a baseball team or a corporation. They are rivals of the vampires for influence and power.
• Robert E. Howard:
  • In Rogues in the House, Conan the Barbarian invokes this to reason that the Beast Man is possible.
    Conan: Everyone knows there are men who take the form of wolves at will''.
  • In Black Colossus, Vagueness Is Coming invokes this for the arrival of the Big Bad.
    werewolves howled across the wilderness.
  • Howard's early story "Wolfshead" depicts true werewolves as wolves possessed by malevolent spirits that transform them into cunning humanoid man-eaters during the full moon. While a human can become subject to a similar transformation, it only happens if the person makes the mistake of killing a true werewolf when it's in hybrid form and its possessing spirit is in control, free to Body Surf into its wolf host's killer. A person so possessed may be spared the affliction if the spirit vacates that person's body in favor of a more-fitting host ... say, a huge man-eating crocodile.
• In Howlers, werewolves — also known as Lupus Sapiens — are humans that turn into near-invisible man-wolves only vulnerable to silver. They can even transmit the condition through bites and scratches.
• The Howling (1977): According to Inez Polk, a person can become a werewolf if they make a deal with the Devil, by inheriting it genetically or, in rare cases, being bitten by a werewolf and surviving. Inez also states that unlike vampires, werewolves aren't undead but are just as alive as humans and have similar lifespans. In their wolf forms they resemble unusually large wolves^note this differs from the better-known film adaptation, which popularised the depiction of bipedal werewolves and they retain their sapience (albeit with their more primal instincts taking over). As wolves, they are preternaturally strong and resilient, being able to heal from almost any injury in days or even hours. The only things that can deal fatal injuries to them are fire and silver. Unlike in Hollywood movies, the full moon has no influence on werewolf transformations; they can turn at will after night falls.
• In Peter David's Howling Mad, the main character is a wolf who is bitten by a werewolf, which causes the wolf to become a human during the full moon.
• The Hunger Games features "muttations", which are essentially hybridized animals. One type of muttation featured in the first book are a bloodthirsty, upright-walking cross between wolves and humans (specifically, the tributes who have already died in the 74th Hunger Games).

I

• In InCryptid, lycanthropy is not a species of cryptid. It is a cryptid mutation of rabies that can affect any mammal (though mammals weighing less than 90 pounds or so invariably die from it before they can infect anything else). It has nothing to do with the full moon and does not work like in the movies. It is a deadly disease and treated as deadly serious, even when it is discovered that after the first couple of changes, those infected return to human intelligence. Humans thus afflicted do not become "evil" as such but do develop short tempers and more aggressive traits as a result of their DNA and body being rewritten to wolf. Even if the humans afflicted can make provisions not to infect anyone else in their uncontrollable phase, the disease is still always fatal: mammal bodies were simply not made to be shapeshifted repeatedly, and the resultant strain on the heart and nervous system will eventually result in the victim's death.
• The eponymous protagonist of Indigo, although her shapeshifting ability seems to be tied to her friendship with a telepathic wolf.
• In Instinct Rising, werewolves stay sane in all forms and transform voluntarily. Their natural Healing Factor is tied to their shifting; the more wolflike they are, the faster they heal. The full moon transfers some energy and subtly affects their thinking but doesn't affect shifting (although given how rough and rowdy werewolf full moon bashes can get, it's apparently a good idea to stay in werewolf form). While they are largely unaffected by alcohol and synthetic drugs, they are strongly affected by absinthe and herbal intoxicants.
• In It's Just A Scratch, lycanthropy results in personalities splitting in two - with one half being the parts a person accepts, and the other being the parts they reject. Werewolves who learn to accept the good and bad of their personality generally do okay and switch back and forth between their forms, but for those that don't, it bubbles up and results in them losing control.

J

• Jason Wood: In Digital Knight, werewolves are very different, particularly in that they're powerful enough that even "the Great Demons" wouldn't lightly defy the will of the Werewolf King Virigar. Also, they devour souls. The narrator's Friendly Neighborhood Vampire friend tells him:
  "Their strength is immense, their cunning formidable, and their ability to shift shape, though confined to a wolflike predator on the one hand, is unlimited in the human range; they can be anyone at all. They do not fear night or day, nor does the phase of the moon have any effect on them. They also have a talent similar to my own to charm and cloud other minds... There is nothing I have seen ... that I fear more than the Werewolf King."
  • Consider the last sentence of that quote in light of the fact that the speaker is five hundred thousand years old and has seen the Great Demons reshape the continents of Earth.

K

• In the Kane Series story "Reflections on the Winter of My Soul", second-rate astrologer Lystric states that there are three main types of werewolves: humans that can take wolf or semi-lupine form, demons that can take wolf form, wolves that can take human form (these being the most dangerous) and lead other wolves; as well as deluded humans who only believe they are wolves but do not shift form. The Big Bad of the story is a type three werewolf. He pretends to be human really well, cannot be harmed by iron, only by silver or direct violence (like strangling or breaking neck), is inhumanly strong and agile, as well as very cunning, and leads a wolf pack against humans.
• Kitty Norville focuses on a werewolf heroine ironically named... Kitty. This series is closer to earth than most werewolf stories in a lot of ways:
  • Rather than being a Wolf Man, werewolves when shapeshifted are different from natural wolf in only three respects: vulnerability to silver, a Healing Factor for anything else and generally increased strength and toughness, and the most obvious difference is a lack of Shapeshifter Baggage. A healthy adult wolf in Real Life weighs about 80 lbs. or so, so an adult male werewolf would be twice the size of a real wolf. Werewolves can be killed without silver — they can just survive more damage than a normal human and heal faster, but being gutted or at ground zero of an IED kills a werewolf perfectly well.
  • The first werewolf pack that we see in the books is led by a bullying, abusive alpha male, but from the second book on we can see that werewolf pack dynamics vary widely. At least two seem to be a normal group of people who just happen to spend full moon nights in the woods together.
  • The Werewolf Theme Naming trope is subverted or just averted; the protagonist herself has a punny Non-Indicative Name purely by chance, and few if any of the many other were-creatures encountered in the series have any connection between their name and what they do.
  • Lycanthropy is infectious. Some characters have feared getting it from being exposed to a werewolf's blood or saliva while that werewolf is in human form, but it hasn't happened in the books themselves. In their human forms, werewolves have the same silver vulnerability, Healing Factor and increased strength that they do as wolves. Female werewolves can't carry a pregnancy to term; shapeshifting causes the fetus to miscarry.
  • A lycanthrope's intelligence is generally reduced to that of his or her animal form when they change, although emotional attachments/associations (i.e., friends, kin, lovers, threats, the idiot that just shot them, etc.) carry over for good or for ill. They can be trained to perform very complex actions with effort, and the human personality exerts an influence on the wolf form similar to that of the wolf's instincts on the human form.

L

• The Legend of All Wolves: First, they view themselves as wolves who take the form of humans, not the other way around. For the most part they can shift at will, but the Iron (full) Moon makes them wilder: if they are "in skin" (human form), it makes them change to "wild" (wolf), and if they're wild, then they become an æcewulf, a real wolf that can no longer change. They are a separate species than human (not capable of producing children with them) and prefer to be called "wolves" or "Pack" rather than "werewolves".
• In Lonely Werewolf Girl, werewolves are mainly vulnerable only to silver, certain magic weapons, and other werewolves; they have accelerated healing only in werewolf form though. Speaking of werewolf shapes, they have three modes: human-looking, a wolf-man/woman half and half mode, and a full wolf mode. They must change on the night of the full moon into one of the latter, but "royal werewolves" can change at any time so long as it is dark outside. A lunar eclipse locks them into their human forms and make them ill while it passes. They are born werewolves, but normal people can be turned through a bite (Though it is a huge offense suggesting that any pure-blood should have been created this way). Having been born in wolf shape, while her mother was in wolf shape, on the night of the full moon, protagonist Kalix feels as if she lives in a permanent lunar eclipse.
• In Loyal Enemies, werewolves are "darklings", creatures which others consider foul, if not downright evil. Werewolves, in both wolf and human forms, have super-strength, super-reflexes, a superior sense of smell, can see in the dark and can speak human in their wolf form. There's mention of there being more than one species of werewolf, with "true werewolves" (including the protagonist, Shelena) being able to change shape any time they want to, although it's slightly painful and their bones are brittle like eggshells during the change. It's also not a pretty sight and Shapeshifting Excludes Clothing. As Shelena explains, werewolves can mate with other werewolves, humans and wolves, but the first option is usually not even wished on one's enemy because the resulting offspring gnaws its way into the world, killing the mother. Mating with wolves is considered a degenerate thing to do for any self-respecting werewolf because it produces barely sentient predators that are neither werewolf not wolf, meaning that the only viable options of procreation are mating with humans or by bite, although apparently the latter doesn't always work.

M

• In Magnus, the nephilim Tsavo has the ability to transform into a slavering wolf as a result of a magic spell he casts.
• In Mercy Thompson, lycanthropy is transmitted through a savage attack — most victims of werewolf attacks die of their injuries rather than turn into werewolves. Werewolves are forced to change at the full moon but can also change more or less at will. Werewolves in human form are resistant to disease and poison, heal quickly, do not die of old age, and have very short tempers. For this reason, the average life expectancy for a wolf after becoming one is ten years. It is worth noting, however, that werewolves certainly don't always die young. The book takes place in the present day, and several wolves are thought to date from the Renaissance. There were even a few who called those young. The Marrok is implied to have known the real King Arthur (and therefore being the real Sir Marrok). Samuel, his son and Asil the Moor are almost as old. Werewolves also have a kind of magic, called pack magic, which allows an Alpha to draw strength from his pack and control them. Pack magic also functions as a limited form of Glamour: normal people who see a shifted werewolf that isn't attacking are prone to thinking that it's just a Big Friendly Dog, which is one of the main ways that the Masquerade was maintained until the werewolves came out in the first novel. Also, particularly powerful werewolves like Adam, the pack Alpha of the Tri-Cities area and Mercy's eventual husband have the ability to adopt a bipedal man-wolf hybrid form if they want to, but it's rarely used.
• In Monster Hunter International, werewolves (Man-Wolf type) are some of the most dangerous and lucrative monsters to hunt. Earl Harbinger, one of the greatest Hunters alive, is one of the strongest in existence.
  • Lycanthropy is spread via bites and is permanent. It's also possible for the curse to be spread through the blood of a pregnant mother to unborn children, though in most cases the child dies in the womb. It's also noted that only humans can become werewolves, so other monsters or even certain Half Human Hybrids can be spared the curse. Of course, there exists the case of a werewolf whose half-breed mother was bitten while he was in the womb, and thanks to said blood was able to survive birth and be born a werewolf.
  • New werewolves will forcibly change upon the first full moon, completely consumed by their animal instincts, and will transform afterwards during the full and new moon uncontrollably. Sufficient pain or emotional response will also trigger the transformation. With time it is possible to control the transformation to only activating on will (and thus retaining some human control), but the night of the full moon is still an uncontrollable and unavoidable animalistic transformation.
  • Werewolves have an extremely potent Healing Factor, which can repair wounds as grievous as entire chunks of the body being torn away, being shot or stabbed in vital organs, massive blood loss, and even having the brain blasted out. It also serves to slow the werewolf's aging down, letting decades-old werewolves look like barely one has passed.
  • In terms of weaknesses, silver works best because it inhibits their regeneration, though it is possible to heal from such wounds with enough time. Fire works just as well since the burning cells are hard to repair, and the complete removal of the head will do the trick too. However, it's made clear that any werewolf can die if they receive enough damage that outtaxes the energy in their bodies (which is part of the reason why werewolves are Big Eaters, they need the extra calories to burn for fuel). A werewolf might be able to regenerate a whole hand with enough time and energy, but no werewolf can store enough energy to survive having all their limbs torn away.
• Moongobble and Me: The titular "Weeping Werewolf" of book 2, who was cursed by the Old Woman of the Forest of Night — simply because he didn't give her any bread when she asked (because he didn't have any) — to transform into an anthropomorphic wolf-man every night as opposed to just on the night of the full moon until a certain condition is met.
• In The Mortal Instruments, werewolves are forced to change at the full moon but can change shape at will at other times; they mostly retain their human minds, though their minds become less human during the full moon. They can be hurt by silver, and the condition is semi-contagious, with about half of all bites transmitting lycanthropy.

N

• In Never Cry Werewolf, the titular werewolf controls his full-moon turnings with medicine. He keeps his human mind during his time as wolf, however.
• In The Neverending Story, Gmork, despite looking like an enormous wolf, describes himself as a werewolf. He tells Atreyu that neither Fantastica nor the Human World are his true home, for he has none. Therefore, he is able to travel between both worlds, appearing as a human in our world and a wolf in Fantastica.
• The werewolves in Newshound can transform between human and wolf form mostly at will. They have a set of wolf instincts which are present at all times in both forms, acting as a sort-of backseat driver in human form and taking over completely in wolf form. While there's no fixed schedule for shifting, going too long between shifts results in increased mental pressure from the wolf instincts, and risks an uncontrolled shift. Werewolf packs are essentially support groups for dealing with the psychological issues stemming from the conflicting demands of the human and lupine halves. While werewolves have accelerated healing and hyperactive metabolisms to accommodate their shapeshifting, shifting is still incredibly painful (and more than a little unpleasant to look at).
• Sergey Lukyanenko can't seem to decide the nature of werewolves in his Night Watch (Series). In some books, they're just as undead as vampires. In others, there's merely the Dark equivalent of Light shifter-mages. The full moon is sometimes mentioned to cause werewolves to go into a frenzy, but nothing of the sort is mentioned for Light shapeshifters. Later books (especially by other authors) introduce other types of "were-beings", including were-snakes (a.k.a. nagas) and a were-Smilodon (a.k.a. sabretooth cat). The latter is the only living example of one, as he was born during the last Ice Age and remembers hunting mammoths; now he works in the European Bureau of the Inquisition. While both vampires and werewolves are considered to be the lowest in the Dark hierarchy, vampires can gain a measure of status and respect by becoming Higher Vampires. This either involves fully draining several dozen humans or drinking a special blood cocktail invented by a young vampire. Werewolves don't have a "Higher" status and always remain low; the above-mentioned were-Smilodon is a rare exception due to his extreme age (at least 12,000 years) and experience.
• Larry Niven:
  • The story "What Good Is a Glass Dagger?" is told from the POV of an idealistic Atlantean werewolf. The surprise bit comes when he discovers that werewolves aren't people who become wolves, but rather wolves who turn into humans.
  • In the Hanville Svetz story "There's A Wolf in My Time Machine'', the time-travelling main character gets sidetracked into a version of Earth where man evolved from wolves instead of apes.
• Not Your Ordinary Wolf Girl mostly sticks to traditional depictions of werewolves, with some exceptions: Involuntary shifting can happen in one's sleep or if one is experiencing high levels of stress or anger, but werewolves can learn to control it, at which point they only change voluntarily. Not feeding enough as a wolf results in intense cravings for meat while in human form. Most unusually, it's a plot point that female werewolves, like main character Sam Lee, are pretty hard to come by: Women who are bitten often simply die from it, and those that do live tend to stay in hiding because they have some body part permanently in "wolf" form. For instance, over the course of the novel, Sam meets one girl who has one human hand and one paw, and another who is entirely wolf from the waist down (she has to wear floor-length skirts to pass, and even then, something just seems slightly "off" about her posture and movement). The title comes from the fact that Samantha is a talented, platinum-winning, indie rock star.
• In No Such Thing As Werewolves, werewolves (of man-wolf variety) are caused by a genetically modified virus and the powers granted differ based on the host's sex. They also come with a handy voice in your head. These guys are also the perfect weapons against zombies.

O

• Oliver Twisted: Werewolves are the descendants of Sköll, the banished son of the wolf god Fenris. Bill Sikes is one of them, and so is his brother Bullseye, though the latter was born unable to shift into human form. They are still weak to silver, silver bullets especially.
• In Operation Chaos, werewolves are persons with a genetic condition. Scientific understanding of the condition in the 20th century allows the werewolf to understand and receive training to keep his human motivations in wolf form (but not full intelligence). The change is permitted by having polarized light as the only light source (either moonlight or a portable "moonflash" carried on the person). The wolf-form heals at Wolverine speeds except when silver is involved. The hero/werewolf/narrator fought in World War II as an Army Ranger and seemed to suffer no social prejudice; he was a movie star before the war, playing a Rin Tin Tin-type character. Conservation of mass is also very much in effect; it doesn't affect the protagonist very much, since a relatively normal-sized man will make an impressively large wolf (largest recorded wolf: 175 lbs./79 kg.), but at one point, he engages in battle with a were-tiger, and the man in question before he changes is described as tall and ridiculously obese in order to have sufficient mass to be a large, powerful tiger (large Siberian tiger: up to 800+ lbs./360 kg.).
• The Otherworld features werewolves that turn into pure wolves at will, but the process is painful. They must Change about once a week, becoming more irritable and restless the longer they put it off, until finally their bodies take over and they Change involuntarily. Control over their Change is a matter of teaching, practice, and willpower. All but one of the werewolves are male, and they pass the gene down to their sons (daughters need not apply). A hereditary werewolf will not have his first Change until late adolescence. Werewolves can be made by an infected bite or by injection with werewolf saliva, but most are hereditary. An infected werewolf will pass the gene down to any sons conceived after his Change. In Broken, Elena gives birth to male and female twins, who are both genetic werewolves and it is hinted the female will Change in adulthood. Since Elena is the first female werewolf and the twins' father is also a werewolf, it is unknown if a hereditary female gets the gene from just her mother or from both parents.

P

• In The Parasol Protectorate, werewolves are very nocturnal. Only Alphas can assume any but a regular wolf form, being able to become the Wolf Man. Also, because Alphas tend to be larger and stronger in their human form, their wolf form tends to look more Dire than normal. Like vamps, the existence of werewolves is common knowledge, and they have an ambassador to the Queen's court. Werewolves are just as dead as vampires, and while they can tolerate the sun eventually, younger werewolves suffer severe burns and even death from exposure to sunlight. They are vulnerable to silver, and just as allergic to basil as vampires are to garlic. Raw meat is a required part of their diet and necessary for them to heal, though Professor Lyall is known to prefer fish. They can only change at night, with the ease of change being directly proportional to the phases of the Moon, up until the full Moon when transformation is inevitable and maddening, and younger ones are often forced into their wolf form a few days before the full Moon. Alphas possess a Partial Transformation called "Anubis Form" which is necessary to convert new pack members. Most see their full moon madness as a curse, which leads them to regard Preternaturals like Alexia as "Cursebreakers" where other supernaturals see them as a dire threat.
• In Prince Caspian, one of the two creatures to tempt Caspian to summon back the White Witch is a werewolf. It is apparently not contagious, as it bites Caspian without transmitting its condition to him.

R

• Red Moon Rising (Moore): Lacking the traditional weaknesses, these werewulves are naturally short and stocky and lack any healing abilities beyond a normal human. Their bite does not transform humans into wulves, they only reproduce through offspring (although they are compatible with humans).
• Played with in Return of the Wolf Man, which addresses some of the inconsistencies and oddities in the films. The book establishes that Talbot becomes the Wolf Man on the days immediately before and after a full moon, thereby explaining his strangely frequent transformations in the movies. The idea that lycranthropy effects different people in different ways is also brought up, hence why Bela from The Wolf Man (1941) turned into a four-legged wolf.
• The Reynard Cycle: The Wargs are Chimera who mix human features with that of canines in general, and wolves in particular. Of all of the Chimera, they are the most feared. They cannot infect others, but they can impregnate non-Warg women.
• Brian Jacques' short story "Rosie's Pet" features a young werewolf named Charlie Lupus. He apparently transforms into his wolf form at night. While fully sane in both forms, he carries a lot of canid mannerisms over into his human form. The titular girl, Rosie Glegg, befriends Charlie over a few days and, at the end of the story, turns into a werewolf herself, apparently just by wanting to.

S

• The Saga of Darren Shan: In The Vampire's Assistant, the wolf man is biologically half wolf and half human, and the mixture has induced madness, resulting in Sam Grest being eaten, and R.V. having his hand bitten off, later becoming a major villain. He is basically humanoid with wolf claws, head and tail etc. along with thick, wiry fur.
• The Satyricon contains a story told about a werewolf who is a wizard, able to transform his clothing into stone and back (so that it remains undamaged while he's changed) and changing fully into a wolf at will. He does not have any kind of accelerated healing and retains his wounds when he changes back (so that a pike through the neck as a wolf becomes a grievous wound that requires a surgeon's attention as a human). (Incidentally, this segment is also well-known to Latin scholars for containing the hapax legomenon "circumminxit", describing the method for transforming his clothes to stone - he pisses in a circle around them).
• The Wolf and Raven stories, which are part of Shadowrun's Expanded Universe, feature a man who is possessed by Wolf, one of the many animal totems of the world, which grants him powers and mannerisms similar to the classic Wolf Man (as well as a Split Personality, of sorts). It should be noted that this is very different from the game's usual take on werewolves.
• In The Shadowspawn, werewolves and vampires are one and the same, a non-undead Mage Species capable of both blood-drinking and shapeshifting. They drink blood and can turn into any animal whose DNA they've sampled, live for centuries, use magic based on altering probabilities and are, except for Defector from Decadence Adrian, Always Chaotic Evil.
• In Toby Barlow's epic poem/novel Sharp Teeth, various gangs of werewolves live in the area of Los Angeles; them becoming aware of each other is the main plot of the book. They change voluntarily into what can be mistaken for stray dogs, some hiding in pounds and even getting adopted.
• In Sheep's Clothing, the character of Wolf Cowrie is half-Skin Walker and essentially a werewolf in everything but name, with keener senses, super-strength, super-agility, and the ability to change into a wolf-like creature. He is not required to shift during the full moon, but silver burns him on contact and a wound from a silver dagger nearly kills him. At no point is he referred to as a werewolf, though, because the term wasn't in common use in the old West of 1874.
• In The Snarkout Boys and the Baconburg Horror, a werewolf is created by eating food containing the Marifesa plant that has been implanted with a mind-control technology. The werewolf itself is rarely seen in full, but seems to be almost ghostlike, with the ability to destroy property. It also writes terrible, terrible poetry.
• A Song of Ice and Fire: "Wargs" are people who can telepathically borrow the bodies of animals in dreams. They're not limited to wolves, but these are seen as good candidates for several reasons — generally, they're social enough to be able to adapt to working with other wolves or a warg's human allies, and as pack hunters they're similar enough in mentality to humans to reduce friction between the minds; the only animals easier to "borrow" are domesticated dogs. Their human body stays the same, although if it is killed while their spirit is within an animal they will be trapped there. All of the Stark children are wargs with a special connection to their pet direwolves. This ability manifests only in worshippers of the Old Gods descended from the first people that populated Westeros. In the south, where people worship the Seven (a Crystal Dragon Jesus centralized religion) the folk memory of wargs has been mythologized and perverted over time, leading southerners to believe that wargs (if they exist at all) do physically transform into wolves, have a craving for human flesh, and can transform others into wargs with a bite.
• The Sookie Stackhouse Mysteries:
  • Weres can change at will but tend to give into the animal instincts and predatory tendencies on the night of the full moon. They can also be shielded from the light of the moon to help them, but they are tense, more easily agitated, and prone to violence and uncontrolled bloodlust during the full moon. Though it's not spelled out explicitly, werewolves may go over entirely to animalism during the full moon if they give into the change or are otherwise provoked into it. Additionally, the Were trait is hereditary and can be passed on to children. Those bitten by weres have a chance at becoming a demonic monster form of that animal — Jason, Sookie's brother, becomes a werepanther.
  • In addition, shapeshifters can change at will into various animals, but most choose one animal form and stick with it, for ease and comfort of transformation. Sam, Sookie's boss, turns into a friendly collie. On the full moon, they must change into their animal form. One shifter in New Orleans turns into an Owl and looks the part slightly even as a human. They maintain human intelligence the entire time, so far. The Shifter trait is hereditary and can be passed on to children. Unlike the vampire population, the Were and Shifter populations are not known to humankind at large. There is friction between the shifters and the weres; the weres consider themselves superior, but to everybody else, they are something akin to blue collar workers.
• In Summer in Orcus, werewolves are wolves who turn into other creatures, and not always at full moons; mention is made of one who turns into a skylark on solstices. The one who Summer meets turns into a cottage and is in peril from house hunters.

T

• Tales of the Fox: The novel Werenight has lots of different varieties of werebeast, including at least one who's hideously impaired by his transformation because he's a were-salmon on dry land, and one enormous barbarian chief who transforms into an equally enormous sabre tooth. Also, the world it's set in has four moons, which adds some wrinkles to the whole "when the moon is full" business. The titular werenight was a night when all four were full at the same time, which caused everyone with even the slightest hint of lycanthropy in their blood (as the condition is apparently hereditary) to transform.
• Tales of the Pack:
  • Some are purebloods, born to werewolf parents with an ability to change into any human or animal form they want, with the wolf form being default. Naturally hermaphrodites starting out, their sex shows up later. They can live for centuries. Purebloods can change at will too. They can also turn into other animals. In Hungry Ghost Sage, Archer's brother, repeatedly turns into a buffalo. Purebloods are also living aphrodisiacs who not only turns on everyone else by their presence, but also may take control as an alpha by this alone.
  • Half-bloods such as Lexie have one werewolf parent. If they drink water from a pool which contains a pureblood's pawprint, it will transform them, as Lexie experiences. They change during the full moon usually, or during intense emotion. In the case of cisgender female/AFAB half-blood werewolves, their period stops and they shift each month by the full moon instead. Male half-bloods frequently are very violent, especially to women, whom they often rape in human form. Those in the Pack manage to turn into more half-human/half-wolf forms. Half-bloods as well can heal fully and quickly while in their wolf forms.
  • Full-bloods don't turn at all, they are basically wolves who have human intelligence and are much more vicious than normal wolves, attacking humans frequently, while they reproduce by raping women. Like the purebloods, full-bloods can live for centuries. They are born as wolves.
  • One rare kind are peacespeakers, who negotiate between packs to make peace, and they can identify werewolves when in human form. A normal werewolf ever having sex with one is taboo in their culture. They can be purebloods or half-bloods.
  • All werewolves can speak in wolf tongue with each other, which just sounds like animal sounds to most humans. They're also equipped with the strong sense of smell normal wolves have, and can easily tell humans apart from traces left behind this way. Purebloods and half-bloods have this in human form too. They can all be harmed using ordinary weapons. Usually they look identical to real wolves.
• Werewolves in The Talisman are called Wolfs and are servants of the crown, acting as shepherds. Even in human form, they are immensely strong and quite honest but not terribly intelligent. They transform into wolves for several days around the full moon, prior to which they slowly lose their humanity. Even as wolves, they retain some sense, but are intensely hungry. They also transform under stress, but it hurts.
• In There Shall Be No Darkness, Dr. Lundgren claims that lycanthropy is the result of a mutation in the pineal gland of the afflicted person's brain, they don't show up in photographs, and they're capable of transformation at will as well, apparently. Also, the sign of the pentagram doesn't mark the werewolf's victim as in The Wolf Man (1941), but rather the witch who is to first be their accomplice and then betray them. However, even among all these differences Blish added, one thing remains the same: silver bullets are still fatal to them and silver in general is something they don't like.
• Tolkien's Legendarium:
  • In The Silmarillion, werewolves are evil spirits transformed into the shape of giant, monstrous wolves. Sauron, who used to be infamous for his shapeshifting powers, was at one point known as the Lord of Werewolves and turned into one in order to fight the mystic wolfhound Huan after they killed the father of werewolves Draugluin. Later Huan and the most terrible of Draugluin's offspring, Carcharoth, kill each other. The Silmarillion also features some magical shapeshifting, which requires the skin of the monster to be imitated. Supplemental material like the tabletop adaptation does allow the werewolves to shapeshift.
  • There are also the Wargs in The Lord of the Rings; giant evil wolves that are sentient, have a language of their own and are allies of the Orcs, even being ridden by them. It's unclear if they're actually related to the werewolves, but some fans have speculated that they're the result of werewolves mating with ordinary wolves. At one point, Gandalf specifies (in Elvish) that the attacking Wargs are werewolves.
  • The Hobbit features Beorn, a "skin-changer" who can shapeshift into a bear at will and uses this ability to kill orcs and wargs.
• The Twilight Saga:
  • Werewolves, called "shapeshifters," are protectors of the Quileute, the Native American tribe of western Olympic Peninsula. It is a genetic trait, and all shapeshifters seen in the series are descended from either Ephraim Black, Levi Uley, or Quil Ateara II, who awoke their shapeshifting gene to defend their tribe from the vampires centuries ago. For a long time, it's believed that only men can inherit the shapeshifter gene, but Eclipse disproves this by revealing that Leah Clearwater has also realized her powers. The shapeshifters first manifested their powers in their late teens, and afterwards will be organized into a pack, led by an alpha, who can instill order to the pack. The shapeshifters have formed a non-aggression pact with the Cullens, the current vampire coven of the area, promising not to attack them under the condition that they will not attack humans, which serves them well because the Cullens only eat animals. They are faster than vampires, but are weaker, and they need to work in a group to overwhelm them. It's said that as long as they regularly shapeshift, shapeshifters will never age.
  • Breaking Dawn mentions that the Quileute shapeshifters are different from actual werewolves. Called the "Children of the Moon," they cannot control their shapeshifting, and can only pass on their powers by biting humans, instead of procreating. Also, they are much stronger than shapeshifters and vampires. Volturi leader Caius once encountered one and barely survived by the skin of his teeth. Fearing their powers, the Volturi staged a genocide of werewolves centuries ago, and since then they are rarely seen and believed by many to be a myth.

U

• The werewolves of Uncommon Animals are born and do not need to change by the light of the moon, full or otherwise. The change can be done manually by the wolf, or involuntarily by a Speaker with the Voice.
• Unique first introduces werewolves in the form of a young woman asleep in her bed who is on her feet running down the hall before fully awakening, because her nose smelled... BACON! These are werewolves who work as mechanics in the family-owned (Well, pack-owned) garage downstairs to pay for food and gas, and love to ride motorcycles. Bonus points for the pack alpha, who loves to ride in a huge pack of... fellow bikers, as part of the Bikers for Babies program.
• In User Unfriendly, one of the NPCs in the game the heroes are playing turns out to be a werewolf. He can transform at will, command ordinary wolves, and has a chance to infect those he bites.

V

• In Vampirocracy, we see Karl the werewolf police detective use his "Beast" to amplify a suspect's fear and anger in the hopes of getting him to slip up during questioning. A "rubber-band effect" causes Karl to nearly lose control when he leaves the interrogation room.
• In Void City, werewolves can transform into their wolf form at any time. They grow stronger as the moon waxes and weaker as it wanes. They are vulnerable to silver; but the stronger they become, the more resistant to it they become. Very powerful werewolves can only be killed by enchanted, blessed, and inherited silver; and the strongest werewolf in the world is a True Immortal who cannot be killed at all.
• In V-Wars, werewolves (man-wolf type) are a subspecies of vampires born from the ice virus. Examples of these lycans include the Loup-Garou, a Romanian scientist woman turned into a foxlike wifwolf, and werewolf/vampire hybrids like the mjertovjec, the lobishomen and the farkaskoldus.

W

• Warhammer novels:
  • The final section of the first book in Gotrek & Felix series, Trollslayer, had the Children of Ulric. Long thought to be a myth, the Children of Ulric were believed to be the decedents of Ulric, god of wolves, war and winter, who could walk as both man and beast. A family of the Children are encountered by the titular heroes, but they were apparently wiped out in the same story.
  • Wolfgang von Newald from the Konrad Saga is revealed to be a werewolf at the end, the final book in the series.
• In Warrior Wolf Women of the Wasteland, lycanthropy refers to a genetic condition shared by all the women in McDonaldland, whereby they change a little bit more into wolves (both physically and in their mannerisms and instincts) every time they have sex, and as they change, their sex drive only increases. This condition is irreversible, and There Is No Cure. As such, sex for women is restricted to within marriage, only for procreation, and is only allowed with a special license issue by the government. Once their changes become too obvious, the wolf-women are exiled into the Wasteland outside of McDonaldland. Eventually, the women transform into savage dire wolves.
• In Warwolf: The Centurion Warrior Book 1: The Warriors,^note The book apparently had a very small print run and is almost impossible to find, but it does have a listing in the Library of Congress — so at least one or two copies are located there — and a copyright number dating its publication the werewolf is a species within a species, as the term "lycanthrope" is a blanket term here (There's mentions of werecats and even a werecobra in one or two chapters.) The werewolves here have multiple forms that range from human to man-wolf to full wolf, though of a much larger size than is normal, while other lycanthropes seem to have a similar set of forms. These werewolves have their own language, can also speak human languages and are part of a secret worldwide empire of various lycanthropes that seem to encompass nearly every animal species known. No indication is given of whether they are human at the start and then change at some point in their youth or the other way around, but the main character is stated to have been able to transform from the age of twelve on up at the very least and is roughly seventeen at the time of the story. According to a note at the start of the book from the author, he wanted to create an entirely new kind of werewolf/shapeshifting world where werewolves aren't just painted as mindless monsters when they transform, so he created the book as the start of a series that came to him at some point. The creatures have abnormally long lifespans (one character is over a hundred years old and is expected to live at least to see two hundred) and a weakness to silver, though some of the lycanthropes paradoxically use silver in the construction of their own weapons. The eponymous character, Warwolf, is shown displaying superhuman strength, which may be an indicator that the other werewolves and assorted lycanthropes share this trait. Warwolf and his three companions are also shown to display superhuman senses. Whether or not anyone else in this society does also is unknown. Warwolf and his friends also appear to have been raised in a partially warrior-toned society before making the trek to Rome to attempt a slow attempt to get humans used to their existence (thus facilitating an inter-species reunification) — it is indicated that werewolves are the most well-known type of lycanthrope and are the most feared, despite the fact that they are not savage, mindless killers and can change at will, and the other lycanthropes in the book share this ability to transform at will as well. The book itself seems to be intended as a set-up to a situation apparently intended to show up in the second book, best summed up as werewolves vs. demons.
• Pulp author Manly Banister wrote four werewolf stories for Weird Tales and invented his own tropes, such as werewolves needing to be submerged in water to transform and female werewolves always being white.
• In Welkin Weasels, werecreatures spend most of their time as normal Talking Animal characters and turn into monstrous flesh-eating humans at the full moon. Fully transformed ones can only be slain by silver bullets, but when Maudlin is nipped slightly by one, they manage to purge the wereweasel infection from him by immediately applying silver to the wound.
• In the Wereapocalypse novel series, lycanthropy the result of a virus that cause the infected to mutate into savage bipedal humanoid wolf-like beasts.
• In The Werewolf Asylum, werewolves are people who transform into wolves every night, but their transformations can be repressed with enough willpower, which is why the titular asylum exists. There also exists a werewolf, named Martha, that is not a human who turns into a wolf, but permanently stays a mixture of both forms. The doctors of the asylum believe that is due to a birth defect, but Martha claims it is because she is a Messiah and lycanthropy is part of a plan from a 'Lord'.
• In Nicholas John Frith's A Werewolf Named Oliver James, the title character unexpectedly transforms for the first time one night after returning from a trip with his school orchestra, accidentally scaring off his classmates. When he realizes what's happened to him, he immediately embraces his new form and abilities and has the time of his life. However, he must return home before dinner and worries about how his parents will react. Much to his relief, he learns that his parents are werewolves too.
• Guy Endore's 1933 novel The Werewolf Of Paris (a tale of a 19th-century French werewolf) is one of the most important werewolf novels.
• WerewolveSS by Jerry and Sharon Ahern starts off with the standard Man-Wolf or Wolf-Man bipedal death machines that change under the full moon. Given time and Nazi science (thus the SS in the title), the remnants of project Werewolf determine that werewolves and their shape-shifting abilities can be controlled through specific types of music. This results in the neo-Nazis running about infecting people with lycanthropy and then using loudspeakers to play Wagner operas that turn them into a goose-stepping werewolf army.
• The Wheel of Time has 'wolfbrothers', men with the ability to communicate telepathically with wolves. Wolfbrothers gain greatly enhanced senses, as well as golden eyes which people remark as resembling those of wolves. Wolfbrothers are prone to acquiring wolf instincts, and in some cases have been known to completely lose touch with their humanity, becoming essentially wolves in men's clothing.
• In the Chivalric Romance William of Palerne, the wolf that protects William and his love proves to be the son of the King of Spain, enchanted by his Wicked Stepmother.
• Wolf Breed: Think Elfen Lied in Middle Ages Europe with werewolves and you have the basic plot. The titular Wolfbreed are man-wolf/dire wolf shapeshifters that can change at will, have a rapid healing factor, age normally and are vulnerable to silver. The Teutonic Knights tries to use them as Super Soldiers — their attempt doesn't work out so well.
• The titular creatures from Wolfen are not shapeshifters but rather a freak evolutionary offshoot which is never fully explained. Though they don't swap forms, they have developed fully articulated paws that act like hands along with human-level intellect (operating in a feral, instinctive manner), making them man-wolves of sorts. Although there isn't any supernatural element to them, the Wolfen are quite frightening, being clever enough to understand human speech, operate mechanical devices, evaluate the threat of guns and feed on us right in our midst, having remained unseen long enough for mankind to dismissed them as fairy tales, or simply forget them altogether. Inside the text itself, one of the present-day characters (inspired by what he believes to be a historical source) theorizes that the Wolfen themselves are the real animal behind stories of the werewolf — however, this is never confirmed beyond their theories.
• In The Wolf Gift, werewolves call themselves Morphenkinder and change every night, unrelated to the phase of the moon, although they can learn to control the change with time. It is passed along by bite, resulting in a Man-Wolf form, which is in fact called the same in-story. Morphenkinder are attracted to evil people and driven to destroy them. Silver has no particular effect on them, and they can be killed by normal weapons, but it takes a lot of damage delivered in a short period of time or they heal it. Even in human form their senses of hearing and smell are very sharp but increase in the Man Wolf form.
• A Wolf in the Soul presents two types of werewolves that are completely unrelated to each other.
  • One is an entire (possibly mythical) species of actual wolves who can only take human form after consuming human blood.
  • The protagonist, Greg, has something entirely different and altogether more mysterious. Dogs begin following him and leaving him gifts, he sees a wolf standing serenely in midair out of a second-story window, and he has blackouts that last only a few minutes or hours but during which he apparently lives out years in a wolf's body. While in wolf form, Greg is also immune to bullets, but though the effect of silver is discussed on occasion (and he can't handle even a few angstroms of silver in a cup of water) we never get to find out if it would actually hurt him or not. It's suggested that he has developed some psychic connection with a real, actual, wolf somewhere out there, which then sought him out physically, confronted him, and then somehow began transforming his body — however, there are a few holes in that theory as well, and a lot of it is left deliberately unexplained.
• In Charles de Lint's Wolf Moon, the main character, Kern, was born as a werewolf. He has control of his transformations but had to hide what he was most of his life. The first time he revealed himself to his family and a lover, they nearly killed him for it. He gets better luck the second time around, but only after he's nearly killed by a hunter with a harp and they try to turn everyone who he's recently befriended against him.
• In The Wolf's Hour by Robert R. McCammon, the werewolves mainly follow the standard man into full wolf pattern and can shift at will. The main difference is that the werewolves age as wolves while in wolf form, so it avoids the issue of everything being solved by turning into a wolf.
• The wolves in Wolves of Mercy Falls Series receive their ability when they are bitten by a person already infected with the werewolf disease. Unlike traditional werewolves, they turn into wolves only during the winter; in warm weather they are normal human beings. The older they get however, the longer they stay wolves, until finally one summer they don't change back at all. And they can't just move south; if they do, they only become more sensitive to temperature change, to the point where even the slightest change in temperature can cause them to shift. The first book Shiver is about a boy and a girl who try to find a way to fight this. The sequel, Linger, reveals that the cure from the first book might not be a cure at all and that the reason they change into wolves might have more to do with brain chemistry than the weather.

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• Xanth: Prince Jeremy, introduced in Zombie Lover, is a voluntary shapeshifter who's telepathic in wolf form. He winds up wedding Jenny Elf.

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