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estelracaSo, in an attempt to not just post Terrible Things that Happen to Animals, I think I'll try doing book reviews for the books I read. These will be as sporadic as my reading schedule, but maybe someone else will enjoy them. Also, fair warning, expect lots of werewolves.
"Fair Game" is the third book in a spin-off series from Patricia Brigg's Mercy Thompson books. The Mercy Thompson books follow a half-Native American coyote shape-shifter as she maneuvers among a Seattle pack of werewolves, also encountering vampires and the fae. Those are first-person POV; the "Alpha and Omega" series follows two werewolves in the same universe, the son of the alpha of all North American werewolves and his omega wife (omega is a wolf who doesn't follow the standard hierarchy and has the ability to calm other werewolves' wolf sides). Both series are good--they're probably my favorite of the urban fantasy werewolf books out there. Briggs' writing style is simple but effective and works for the stories she's telling. I really like her world-building--she does a good job of creating a world where I believe that all of these other races have lived alongside humanity, and she's doing a really good job with their coming out to the human population (first the fae, then the werewolves).
"Fair Games" follows Anna (the omega) and Charles (the alpha) as they work with the FBI to try to stop a serial killer. The primary themes are guilt, love and justice--when we should and shouldn't feel guilt and what it can do to those around us, how strong in both a positive and a negative light love can be, and what entails justice and who gets to deliver it. There's repetition around the theme that powerful people tend to keep themselves away from love because it's dangerous--love hurts, love makes them vulnerable, and, above all, love makes the *rest* of the world vulnerable. Because someone in power who loves (be it a mate or a child) will act on that love... and it might change everything. It's something that really doesn't come together until the last 5-10 pages of the book, but I really enjoyed those last few pages and they are going to have a serious impact on the rest of Briggs' universe. I'm looking forward to seeing how she handles it. (It's actually kind of the theme of this spin-off series, that people loving is what drives things, for good or ill, and that the more power a person has the more careful they are about loving and also the more at love's mercy they are. It'll be interesting to see where it goes from here.)
There's a few things I didn't like about the book. There's been an increasing repetition of rape as a plot point in both of Briggs' series. It never feels terribly out of place--it's always the bad guys, the characters tend to handle it realistically, but it's just starting to get jarring. Briggs' werewolves have a lot of things I like (both forced change with the full moon and the option of changing in between, pack bonding and empathic communication, thrill of the hunt without being complete monsters) and some things I don't (why so much misogyny in all werewolf cultures, I know I know it's a reflection of human society but really we can mix it up, authors, I swear, and having a female werewolf/shifter stronger than their mate will not make the book spontaneously burst into flame). Also, Charles is always Infinitely More Special than the rest of the werewolves. He's half-Native American, and he always gets to break the rules because of his shamanic powers. Some of the rule-bending I'm starting to be more forgiving on (the ghosts and spirits are cropping up in the Mercy series too, and it seems to be more of an Old World versus New World inherent magic that's hopefully going to come to a head soon), but it makes it feel like the author's trying too hard to make him interesting when really, being basically the second-in-command for all the werewolves in North America and having to inflict the alpha's justice on the rest of the wolves would have been enough.
Overall, if you like urban fantasy or werewolf books, this author and these series are definitely worth a look. There's nothing stylistically that's going to blow anyone away with the writing, but it's solid and easy to read. The universe is consistent and interesting, and I like all the characters (some a great deal--I would say I would love a series about the Marrok, the alpha werewolf, but he's always at his most interesting when he only shows up for short stints). The first of the Mercy Thompson books is "Moon Called" and the first of the Alpha and Omega books is "Cry Wolf".
"Fair Game" is the third book in a spin-off series from Patricia Brigg's Mercy Thompson books. The Mercy Thompson books follow a half-Native American coyote shape-shifter as she maneuvers among a Seattle pack of werewolves, also encountering vampires and the fae. Those are first-person POV; the "Alpha and Omega" series follows two werewolves in the same universe, the son of the alpha of all North American werewolves and his omega wife (omega is a wolf who doesn't follow the standard hierarchy and has the ability to calm other werewolves' wolf sides). Both series are good--they're probably my favorite of the urban fantasy werewolf books out there. Briggs' writing style is simple but effective and works for the stories she's telling. I really like her world-building--she does a good job of creating a world where I believe that all of these other races have lived alongside humanity, and she's doing a really good job with their coming out to the human population (first the fae, then the werewolves).
"Fair Games" follows Anna (the omega) and Charles (the alpha) as they work with the FBI to try to stop a serial killer. The primary themes are guilt, love and justice--when we should and shouldn't feel guilt and what it can do to those around us, how strong in both a positive and a negative light love can be, and what entails justice and who gets to deliver it. There's repetition around the theme that powerful people tend to keep themselves away from love because it's dangerous--love hurts, love makes them vulnerable, and, above all, love makes the *rest* of the world vulnerable. Because someone in power who loves (be it a mate or a child) will act on that love... and it might change everything. It's something that really doesn't come together until the last 5-10 pages of the book, but I really enjoyed those last few pages and they are going to have a serious impact on the rest of Briggs' universe. I'm looking forward to seeing how she handles it. (It's actually kind of the theme of this spin-off series, that people loving is what drives things, for good or ill, and that the more power a person has the more careful they are about loving and also the more at love's mercy they are. It'll be interesting to see where it goes from here.)
There's a few things I didn't like about the book. There's been an increasing repetition of rape as a plot point in both of Briggs' series. It never feels terribly out of place--it's always the bad guys, the characters tend to handle it realistically, but it's just starting to get jarring. Briggs' werewolves have a lot of things I like (both forced change with the full moon and the option of changing in between, pack bonding and empathic communication, thrill of the hunt without being complete monsters) and some things I don't (why so much misogyny in all werewolf cultures, I know I know it's a reflection of human society but really we can mix it up, authors, I swear, and having a female werewolf/shifter stronger than their mate will not make the book spontaneously burst into flame). Also, Charles is always Infinitely More Special than the rest of the werewolves. He's half-Native American, and he always gets to break the rules because of his shamanic powers. Some of the rule-bending I'm starting to be more forgiving on (the ghosts and spirits are cropping up in the Mercy series too, and it seems to be more of an Old World versus New World inherent magic that's hopefully going to come to a head soon), but it makes it feel like the author's trying too hard to make him interesting when really, being basically the second-in-command for all the werewolves in North America and having to inflict the alpha's justice on the rest of the wolves would have been enough.
Overall, if you like urban fantasy or werewolf books, this author and these series are definitely worth a look. There's nothing stylistically that's going to blow anyone away with the writing, but it's solid and easy to read. The universe is consistent and interesting, and I like all the characters (some a great deal--I would say I would love a series about the Marrok, the alpha werewolf, but he's always at his most interesting when he only shows up for short stints). The first of the Mercy Thompson books is "Moon Called" and the first of the Alpha and Omega books is "Cry Wolf".
no subject
Date: 2013-03-23 02:20 am (UTC)I thought both books seemed intriguing and were well-written. But since I tend to be repelled by mythologies where there's a strict natural hierarchy combined with universalized male dominance, I stopped reading. Hypermasculine alpha male characters often make me roll my eyes (and, on occasion, fling the book across the room). The Briggs books didn't make me do either of those things, but they seemed to be heading in that direction. Was I was judging too hastily? Would you recommend another look?
Incidentally, one reason why I really like your LM werewolf AU is that your characters are struggling to reconcile their instincts with egalitarian ideals and also the uber-alpha is female.
no subject
Date: 2013-03-30 02:06 am (UTC)As for hypermasculine alpha male characters... I've been debating whether the series is worth it or not, and I still don't know. I wish there were more female characters in Briggs books, desperately. That being said, the ones that are present tend to be interesting and well-developed, even if it takes several books for there to be development. There are a lot of hypermasculine alpha male characters, but there's also a fair amount of playing with it. Dominant wolves are also supposed to be protective. The most dominant werewolf likes looking like a young, harmless art student. A desire for family is a driving force for several of the male characters, including a desire for children. There's a gay werewolf as a secondary/tertiary character. And Mercy has serious issues with the possibility of losing her own self-determination and independence if she gets involved with the werewolves too deeply. So despite sometimes wanting to punt the books, because why does there always have to be universalized male dominance in werewolf societies, they always give me something that makes me want to come back.
My werewolf Les Mis AU is totally self-indulgent, with everything I want to see in a werewolf society. Because with human intelligence should come human questioning of any dominance hierarchy, and because when we get to do whatever we want with a new society reiterating misogyny over and over seems stupid. I'm happy that other people have as much fun with it as me.