Talulla Rising

By: Glen Duncan

Narrated by: Penelope Rawlins

Length: 14 hrs and 4 mins

Publisher's summary

When I change I change fast. The moon drags the whatever-it-is up from the earth, and it goes through me with crazy wriggling impatience.... I’m twisted, torn, churned, throttled - then rushed through a blind chicane into ludicrous power.... A heel settles. A last canine hurries through. A shoulder blade pops. The woman is a werewolf.

The woman is Talulla Demetriou. She’s grieving for her werewolf lover, Jake, whose violent death has left her alone with her own sublime monstrousness. On the run, pursued by the hunters of WOCOP (World Organisation for the Control of Occult Phenomena), she must find a place to give birth to Jake’s child in secret.

The birth, under a full moon at a remote Alaska lodge, leaves Talulla ravaged, but with her infant son in her arms she believes the worst is over - until the windows crash in, and she discovers that the worst has only just begun....

What follows throws Talulla into a race against time to save both herself and her child as she faces down the new, psychotic leader of WOCOP, a cabal of blood-drinking religious fanatics, and (rumor has it) the oldest living vampire. Harnessing the same audacious imagination and dark humor, the same depths of horror and sympathy, the same full-tilt narrative energy with which he crafted his acclaimed novel The Last Werewolf, Glen Duncan now gives us a heroine like no other, the definitive 21st-century female of the species.

©2012 Greg Duncan (P)2012 Random House Audio

Critic reviews

“The horror genre at its best - wildly imaginative, written with wit and intelligence, wickedly entertaining.” (The Times [UK])

“Irresistible... As with The Last Werewolf, Duncan writes with caustic edge and pop-culturally relevant humor... His gorgeous prose makes these books more than just werewolf-genre flashes in the proverbial pan.” (Dallas Morning News)

“The arch relationship Duncan establishes with his readers - along with his scathingly intelligent psychological insights and flat-out killer writing, his companionably high-mannered narrative voice, and his mad plot chops - makes Talulla Rising a high-calorie blast... Duncan delivers with intelligent humanity a monster we want to track and befriend, even knowing she would happily eat us alive.” (Heidi Julavits, New York Times Book Review)

Big Bad Wolf Needs Some *!@*#?! Lifebuoy Soap

I feel the need to qualify this unorthodox review, and admit I didn't continue beyond 4 1/2 hrs. (so pass on this if you want the complete experience of a listener):
I've filled a few "Swear Jars" in my day; there have been times I couldn't kiss my mama with this mouth; I had the un-cut version of the song "Up Against the Wall Mother F-ers" in the 60's, not proud of it (it was just bad music); I'm not prudish or judgemental, and I fully support the First Amendment...but holy *!#*?*! I just ran into the first object in my life that I find so gratuitously offensive that even the ususal for-art's-sake pass can't excuse this hot obscene mess. The very raw and adult prequel, The Last Werewolf (which I liked - wrote a positive review) was just rough-foreplay in comparison. It too was literally peppered with C-Bomb assaults, dropped every few pages, ...but this was C-Bomb/F-Bomb Blitzkrieg; all shock and no awe. My ears have been vi-o-lated.

If you were to cut every *!?@#! word out of this book (you'd have about 1/2 the bulk), the detailed crude acts alone would still keep this one in the category of #**?&! There is erotic...then there is just plain debasement...then there is this. The crass language and lascivious behavior of Duncan's werewolves are far more convincing arguments for folks to start packing silver bullets than the much less repugnant idea of being attacked, mauled, and possibly becoming one of his repulsive potty-mouthed creatures. (I hope she-wolf Talullah doesn't lick her hind-end with that muzzle.)

Narrator Penelope Rawlins was just as bad as the material she was reading, and her male French accent was painful, or ridiculous. Last Werewolf, for all of its vulgarity, was at least performed by Robin Sachs with his aristocratic-sounding voice, Penelope just sounded uncouth -- any redeeming savior faire that Jake possessed and left as a legacy was mangled by Penelope/Talulla. [*Listen to the difference in the samples provided from each book.] But in fairness, it would take an extraordinarily mellifluous voice to make these words sound nice. After this performance/material, I'd advise her, with sincere concern, to take her mouth through a car wash (which I'll bet she did).

I thought Duncan bravely pushed the boundaries with The Last Werewolf, giving the whole monster-lore an unabashedly brazen beast that was original and "believable." Talullah Rising was one of the books I'd been looking forward to reading, even knowing the material would be borderline hard-core, the language flat-out nasty. I found out I have limits. Too bad, because what I did make it through was interesting, and I feel like I missed out on a good storyline. Duncan, you're a good writer -- WT *#!@%!!*?

I hope that you have better luck, and some Herculean tolerance. *Words do have the power in and of themselves to be offensive, especially en masse. Just ask your mom, your sisters, your wife, your daughters.

Worst. Narration. Ever.

This is a sequel to The Last Werewolf, which was a great book with a great narrator. Tallula Rising is a pretty good book with a terrible narrator, which ruined the book for me. I assume Penelope Rawlins is a good narrator for particular roles, but this was NOT one of them. The third book is due out in 2014 and I'm begging Glen Duncan: PLEASE do not use this voice actor again!
Let me elaborate. The main character of this book is a 30-something cynical woman from Brooklyn who becomes a werewolf. The narrator of the audiobook sounds like a 20-year-old girl and has a neutral, middle-East Coast patois, but randomly slips into a Bostonian/Bronx accent with words like "orchard" (awwchud) and "pattern" (pat'n). If the whole narration was done as a New Yorker, she might have pulled it off, but it's so arbitrary that it sounds like an amateur mistake and gets really annoying by the halfway mark.
More annoying is the frequent and bizarre mispronunciation of common words. How can a professional voice actor repeatedly mispronounce "capillary" and "Haitian"? This happened so often that I found myself correcting her out loud, in my car, my house and on the street. By Chapter 20, I was shouting. People stared.
Even so, I have to admit that I really enjoyed the storyline. A warning: the author is rather obsessed with the word "c*nt", and there's a lot of gore (it IS about werewolves), but as long as that doesn't bother you, it's a great storyline. If I had read the traditional, paper book, it would have gotten 4.5 stars.

Too many cultural errors to enjoy

I am a fan of Glen Duncan. I loved ???The Last Werewolf??? and ???I, Lucifer???; so, I was really excited about this book. ???Tallula Rising??? starts less than a year after ???The Last Werewolf??? ends; so, Tallula is still grieving for Jake and about to give birth to Jake???s offspring. After giving birth, Tallula???s child is kidnapped, and the reader is taken on the journey to recover said child. Seems interesting, right? It isn't. Most of this book is spent describing the newborn. Plot development is slow and Duncan continues to have Tallula use British slang instead of American slang even though she is supposed to be American. Because of these constant cultural errors, it is impossible to get lost in the story. Ultimately, Glen Duncan is too male and too British to channel a female American. This is not Duncan???s best work. The narrator also doesn???t help. She keeps dropping accents in the middle of dialogue and confusing accents between characters. If you want to read this book, I suggest buying the text, because as an audio production, it is awful.

Horrible narrator

This book wasn’t for you, but who do you think might enjoy it more?

People who enjoy poor narrators.

Who was your favorite character and why?

The infants. They hardly spoke.

What didn’t you like about Penelope Rawlins’s performance?

She bit off more than she could chew, so to speak. My biggest beef, besides her sounding like a twelve-year-old, was her constant mispronunciations. Here are two: "Haitian" is hi-eeshun and "reprisal" is "ruh-preezul." And she's constantly mispronouncing words, usually in really awful accents.

What character would you cut from Talulla Rising?

My gripe is with the narrator, not the story.

Oh I'm So Disappointed!

I really (pause) really (pause) wanted to like this book. I absolutely adored "The Last Werewolf". Everything I loved in that book is absent in this one. The tale is told from the perspective of an oversexed, barely adult narrator. She whines about pretty much everything. She is annoyingly introspective, without much experience to look back on.

I didn't much enjoy Penelope Rawlins performance - though I don't think the author gave her much to work with. There is nothing like the lyrical prose of the first book. I trudged on to the end of this work, hoping against hope that something interesting would emerge. Alas, I did not uncover any gems.

This, my friends, is a dud.

Horrible Narration

Any additional comments?

Wish I had listened to the audio sample first. The narration is just awful - her performance is just lousy, and her voice/delivery doesn't fit the character/story. Total waste of a credit. Such a shame, as the narrator for the first book was spot on...

Literary force applied judiciously, and shockingly

I've listened to The Last Werewolf (the prior book in this series) more than once - the prose is often of a quality that invites reflection, like one may indulge in a particularly fine food.

Talulla Rising is similar, though with a main character who is, naturally since she's much younger, is somewhat less refined in speech and depth of experience - but also less bogged down by the past, and more ruled by the immediacy of her situation. Not yet weighed down by a lifetime or two worth of being a monster, she's, as of yet, free to experience life with new eyes.

It does lead to a different tone at times - it is naturally far less cynical than the prior novel, as bitterness has not had the time to develop. The inevitability of bad things is still present, as it was in the first - and the daunting nature of the world is still there, naturally. Simply expect young Talulla, along with most of the other characters, to grapple without the benefits or burdens of experience alike.

Some may struggle with the vulgarity of the subject matter itself, but it's ultimately delivered with very finely crafted words - just don't expect to be shielded from the nature of the subject matter.

In fact, that someone capable of this sort of verbal depth, combined with a lack of shyness, applies himself to matters often glossed over and given a sparkly, superficial Twilight sort of way, it's utterly enthralling. Some will come looking for junk food, which goes down easy, gives a sugary thrill, feeds a sort of unthinking addiction, so forth. This book, like it's predecessor, feeds more particular and complex tastes - some will love it, and others will reject it outright. But that's where this particular series will inevitably reside - a sharp flavor, which will reward those who can appreciate it.

A few final notes -

The voice actor's style grew on me in time, though the accent for Talulla herself can be a little uneven. A learned Queens style, which only becomes very evident in a few words, a little too evident. Forgivable, though, just overly noticeable.

It's really delightful to have multiple strong female leads - and it's touched on, but not overstressed.

There are certain avenues I really crave to hear more of - but I think I'll need to wait for the next book. The possibilities are clearly there for it, by the end.

I should have just read the first book.

Would you recommend this book to a friend? Why or why not?

I would not recommend this book. The story in this book was not as good as the first book. Just too much randomness and happy accidents. And one of the more interesting story points carried over from the first book (the one that involves a certain old book) was just skimmed over and never really talked about in detail till the very last of the book and even then there was no explanation. My other big problem with it was the narrator. Penelope Rawlins does a fine job reading and the different voices she can come up with are great, except for the voice of the main character. The main character is American and although I do not know for sure I would guess that Penelope is Australian. Americans do not use soft R's nor do they say the word skeletal as ske-ly-tle. This went on through out the book in more ways than I could ever begin to list here and really started to drive me crazy about half way in. It actually got to the point that I would turn the book on just hear how the narrator will mispronounce words.

What was your reaction to the ending? (No spoilers please!)

Blah, not a big deal.

Would you be willing to try another one of Penelope Rawlins’s performances?

Probably not, unless she is not trying to perform with an American accent.

If this book were a movie would you go see it?

I am pretty sure I already have. (Underworld.....)

I need some one to like

What disappointed you about Talulla Rising?

There was no one in the story to like they are all killers like killing enjoy killing think it is
there right to kill. I need a good guy some one to like.

Has Talulla Rising turned you off from other books in this genre?

no

Have you listened to any of Penelope Rawlins’s other performances before? How does this one compare?

Performances was good the writing was fine i need a good guy in my books

What character would you cut from Talulla Rising?

not cut i need a champion

A Must Read for the Wolf-fan!!!

What did you love best about Talulla Rising?

After reading The Last Werewolf by Glen Duncan and having a hard time getting into the story at first, I was a little hesitant to pick this one up. BOY AM I GLAD I DID!!!

I have always loved werewolf stories, but of late, they seem to only be in romance novel disguised at horror or silly teenage heart-throb tales with shiny vampires... Though there is plenty of romance, this is not a PG-13 tale of teenage longing. It is a visceral, violent adult story with true horror, lust, sex and gore.

What did you like best about this story?

Following the main character's (Talulla) development as she expands her acceptance of what and who she is, while reluctantly embracing motherhood is a fascinating joyride into a beloved genre that is often abused and given little depth. Instead of lip-service, Duncan dives headlong into the tough questions of morality, love, and parental torment as he bring the raw being of his characters to the reader in full spectrum. His unblinking glimpses their reality are sometimes unpleasant, unclean and unrelenting but by the end you find your appetite ready for more...