Women Who Run with the Werewolves: Tales of Blood, Lust, and Metamorphosis

This is a collection of stories with a women-as-werewolves theme, and includes the wonderful (if provocatively-titled) "Boobs", Suzy McKee Charnas' tale of a girl who finds puberty to be an unpleasant kind of shape-shifting, before she encounters a more... interesting... kind. [This story's a great antidote to some of those sickeningly-sweet books-for-teen-girls that tried to persuade us what a wonderful thing it was to get our first periods. Ahem!] I also enjoyed Ursula K. LeGuin's "The Wife's Story," which takes the usual werewolf tale from a different point of view. And Thomas S. Roche's "Sisters of the Weird" introduces a troubled young woman to a very unusual new friend. (I'd read Roche's work in other anthologies and was pleased to find him here as well.) As with most collections there are ups and downs in this one, but overall I enjoyed the variations on the theme. [I see that the other reviewers aren't as impressed, and it's true that I've read stronger collections, but I still think this one's worth a look.]