Anna Latham is an omega. A special breed of werewolf that is outside of the true pack structure who is not bound to obey dominance but isn’t a true submissive either. After the execution of her abusive alpha and her surprise mating with Charles, the enforcer for his father Bran, who is the High Alpha of North America, she is ready to start her new life in Montana and take care of her injured mate, Charles. But life intervenes in the form of a werewolf gone rogue, and Charles’s services are needed again.
Stop!
This book requires that you have knowledge of two other books to read and understand this one. It is not the start of a series. It cannot stand on its own. The blurb is misleading. And you will be confused like I was.
If you want to read the series go back and read the first book of the Mercy Thompson series and then track down the novella Alpha and Omegas, which appeared in the anthology On the Prowl.
Trust me, you’ll enjoy this book a lot more if you do.
That warning out of the way, how did I feel about this book?
Confused and disappointed.
So this was my very first Patricia Briggs novel. I haven’t read anything by her before. And after feeling so incredibly confused and lost for much of the book, I’m not gonna read anything by her again.
The initial romance all takes place in a novella that is incredibly hard to find. And it was not available in any of the 4 library systems I have access to and I looked. Additionally, many of the events referenced in this book and that are important to this book took place in the first Mercy Thompson novel. I mean I felt like I came in on a movie over halfway through, and that’s not a good look for a book one of a series. I do not know what the publisher was thinking. At the very least, the novella should have been included in this book. Because of that lack of connection and meeting initially I had a hard time believing the romance between Anna and Charles. I thought she had better chemistry with Asil or Bran. Like seriously. I didn’t buy it.
The sex scenes, what there were of them, were uninspiring to say the least. I felt like the author didn’t want to write them and that came across in the writing.
I also had a hard time liking Anna because so much of her backstory happened in another book that her actions just read as TSTL or damsel in distress. Charles was kind of there. I couldn’t really get a good read on him. He was so very bland.
The plot, such as it was, was pretty much there. While the story does improve about halfway through the book, it wasn’t enough to make up for half of a book of confusion. Seriously authors… don’t do this.
Additionally there’s some pretty problematic Tropes in play regarding Native American culture and belief systems. And there was some toxic masculinity as well, especially regarding the need for therapy and mental health.
Honestly I do not understand the hype for this book in the series. I* fully admit I read this because it’s the first instance of A/B/O dynamics in traditionally published books. And if you’re curious why I would go looking into that, well… there’s this person named Addis*n C@in.
But back to this book, I’m not gonna be continuing with this, and I don’t care enough to track down and read the earlier books to find out what I missed. In fact, this book has turned me off of anything written by Patricia Briggs and the Mercy Thompson series.
One star
If this is your jam, you can get it here.
If you like these kind of honest reviews, please consider supporting us here!