GUEST POST: The Poetry of the Wolf-Girl by Kim Bannerman

It gives me great pleasure to welcome another guest post from a writer taking part in the Hic Dragones Wolf-Girls blog tour. Today I welcome Kim Bannerman, author of the story 'A Woman of Wolves Born'.



Question: What’s so fascinating about female werewolves?

Answer: For me, it’s simple. Female werewolves are fascinating because they are completely, utterly free. They embody the capricious, confident spirit that so many women desire: they are free of hesitation, free of obligation, free of restraint. Female werewolves do not cast fearful glances over their shoulders when they walk down dark alleys. They do not stay safe behind locked door. They don’t freak out when they find a bit of hair where society tells them none should be. Female werewolves can be bitches, and it’s totally okay, because it’s not an insult: it’s biology.

Image: Shawn Pigott

Of course, I can only speak to finding them fascinating in a female sort of way. I love to read about female werewolves because I love what they can do, and I wish I could do it, too. I can’t speak to why men find them fascinating, if they even do at all.

But while men might not find the concept of unrestrained liberation as intoxicating as I do, I wager there’s a good portion of the male population that finds female werewolves fascinating in a whole other way. A werewolf is powerful, unpredictable, and brimming with bestial sexuality. Female werewolves are sleek, lithe and strong, and unabashed by their body. (Vampires are sexy, too, but they don’t run around naked and athletic.) Have you ever seen a pack of wolves, running through the snow? Their bodies are fluid and fierce, and they slice through the air like arrows.

Now translate that into a woman’s form. See her move with grace through a crowded street, her head held high, her bright eyes catching every movement. She is an apex predator, a silent shadow that slips between the cacophonic traffic of an urban setting. Her heightened senses sample the delights that surround her: the smell of almond biscotti in a bakery window, the sound of the heartbeats of those around her, the touch of the cool autumn breeze as it ruffles the leaves of the elms in the park.

Image: Shawn Pigott

And tonight, when the moon is full, she will leave behind her human form to creep silently along silver-touched paths, a beast capable of poetry. She will embrace her bitchiness, delight in the taste of blood on her teeth, and drive all the wolf-boys wild.

Kim Bannerman's story is one of seventeen new female werewolf stories in Wolf-Girls: Dark Tales of Teeth, Claws and Lycogyny, edited by Hannah Kate and published by Hic Dragones. For more information, or to buy a copy, please visit the publishers' website.