Deacon Chalk can’t enjoy a good day – something bad
always happens that he can’t ignore. This time it was a man beating a dog. But
when he intervened he found that the man was no man – and the dog no simple dog
either. He quickly becomes the rescuer of a lycanthrope and facing off against
an entire pack of predatory shapeshifters
But more, he has stepped into a civil war – between predatory
shapeshifters who wish to dominate, kill and control prey species as they
always have – and those who are seeking for a more egalitarian co-existence.
This, combined with Charlotte’s involvement and the fact the predators are just
bad guys Deacon Chalk doesn’t want in his city is reason enough for him to get
involved.
But things are not that simple – and whatever the mission
of the peaceful weres is, they’re clearly more than they seem and perhaps more
than Deacon Chalk can tolerate. Especially since he’s putting his friends, his
people at risk for someone else’s war.
This book is one of those that vindicates my habit of not
giving up on a series just because
the first book (or the first several books) didn’t work for me.
It’s not that this book is radically different from the first book – it isn’t. Much of the style remains the same – so it’s still very much a male power fantasy, it’s still a book of getting the girl, saving he innocent and running around in a big car with a big gun and blowing stuff up and beating stuff up and cutting stuff up while the character equally gets mauled himself in a big, dramatic, gorefest action-movie style romp.
It’s not sophisticated, it’s not subtle and it’s not
going to engage too many brain cells – but that doesn’t mean it can’t be
immense fun! There’s a weredinosaur for crying out loud! A weredinosaur! Your
arguments are invalid!
What has happened is that a lot of the irritants that
were in book 1 have been toned down a lot. They’re still there, but in a much
much much less annoying fashion. So is it still long winded? Yes, but it’s not
nearly as repetitive – we get the long spiel about his guns, once. Not four or
five times. And the spiel’s not as long. He waxes lyrically about how amazing
his car is – but he doesn’t do it every few pages. We hear what music he’s
listening to, but we don’t get treated to the Deacon Chalk guide to all things
musical. This helps, this helps so much that I don’t have feel like I have to skim
past endless pointless irrelevancies to try and drag the actual story out from
the fluff
