Patricia Briggs 'Cry Wolf'

You may have noticed I'm quite into Patricia Briggs lately. A good friend just gave me Robin McKinley's book Chalice and the two authors remind me of each other. Not in the writing style, but in the power of the characters and storylines.

Cry Wolf is probably my least favorite Patricia Briggs book so far. I suppose any book that is related to the Mercy Thompson books but doesn't have her in it, is going to be a difficult sell. Mercy's (relatively) complicated world doesn't draw me, she does.

Anyway, Anna is an Omega wolf. She's been abused by her pack leader in Chicago and when the marrok finds out about it, the alpha of her pack is killed and she's taken back to Montana for safe keeping. Charles, the marrok's son and his enforcer, recognizes her as his mate....

I was annoyed that being an Omega is not explained, and I didn't really buy the fact that no one explained it completely to Anna, much less to me. Way too much of the book's plot relied on the fact that Anna and Charles are very taciturn. Okay, there's taciturn, and then there's taciturn.

I like Patricia Briggs, she writes a good story, I just didn't love either of these characters. There was a lot that could have been avoided if a few of the characters had talked to each other at all, so the plot didn't ring as true to me as it might have otherwise.

Fantasy Werewolf Fiction 2008: 2.5 out of 5 immortal Spanish witches.

Patricia Briggs 'Moon Called'

I read my first Patricia Briggs book this year and really dug it, and I'd seen a lot of fans of the Mercy Thompson books so I picked up this one, the first in the series. I don't know that I liked it as much as 'Steal The Dragon' which was all about the female protagonist, I barely remember the love interest in that one. Mercy is surrounded by men who love her. Older characters who are looking out for her, younger characters who have crushes on her and then the characters who outright vie for her affections, although she gives them little encouragement.

Mercy as a character is terrific, she's stubborn, smart but willing to act impulsively for things she thinks are right and worth some risk. She also thinks she knows the limits of her abilities (a smart/likable trait) but keeps finding that they might be wider than she thought (a lovely trait in a fantasy character).

There's the female teenage sidekick type character who needs to be rescued, a very convoluted bad guy plot, and a bunch of werewolves running around. I will knock the book for the overly convoluted bad guy plot, but I personally didn't mind too much as I was more interested in the character development and the world building. I have to guess that the author was as well.

The only other defect, although that's a strong word, was the number of males vieing for Mercy's affections. I mentioned I don't even remember the love interest in Stealing the Dragon, that's because that book was only marginally about love. This book spends a lot of time obliquely fixed on Mercy's possible male match-up's and while that tension drew me through a lot of the book, it's not resolved at the end. I knew this wasn't a romance novel, so I didn't feel cheated by the lack of resolution, but if it ain't a romance novel, maybe I can complain a little about the focus on (in this werewolf world) mates.

That being said, I love P. Brigg's female characters. They're tough, but use their smarts, not their brawn to get out of the trouble that their soft hearts get them into. I would highly recommend this book to lovers of urban fantasy/women protagonist fiction. This is a good one, and I'm looking forward to the rest of the series.