Stephanie Foxe

The MC is supposed to be strong and kickass and it comes across as if the author truly believes she is actually writing a character like that.
But in reality, the MC is a weak-willed pushover that constantly makes stupid decisions.
She thinks about a decision, points out to the reader that it is stupid, decides to do it anyway, and then it turns out it was indeed stupid and she ends up suffering consequences. That's the loop these books cycle. I've read ca. 65% and it never changes, round and round.

Beyond that, the plot couldn't be more clichée. The protagonists, as well as the antagonist, are so deeply stereotypical that it borders on parody.

And then there are plot holes everywhere. But the typical plot holes aren't contradictions in the world-building or the magic. Both are way too fuzzy to have any strong rules that could be contradicted in the first place. The plot holes consist of completely illogical and absurd thought processes. Sometimes it's just a plain TSTL MC, but missing common sense affects all characters pretty much equally. This is typically only the case if flawed logic is needed to steer the plot. But it's pretty much the only tool the author uses to steer the plot and it happens constantly.… (plus d'informations)

I am surprised by how little attention this book has received.
It's nothing special but it does what it does better than a lot of books with 50 times the ratings and the same average.
I think this is a good example of how much of a difference a famous name and a big publisher can make.
The main difference between this story and other werewolf pack stories is that there is no romance or love interest worth mentioning. (Maybe that's the issue?) A lot of what this book does I would categorize as young-adult but I can see why someone decided against that label.

Now let's get to the actual book. There were a few things that irritated me.
This book makes use of a very effective tool in a blunt way to keep engagement high which I don't like. Injustice because of prejudice and use of influence behind the curtain against the underdogs. But the entire thing felt forced and unbelievable. If someone is powerful enough to influence Police investigations he should be smart enough to trap his "accidentally" bitten werewolves without alarming them first to what he is up to for example. A lot of the plot relies on the stupidity of supposedly smart, ruthless, influential, and powerful people, which always rubs me the wrong way.
The unjust treatment of the underdog has a very strong allure regardless of the rather crude setup.
Despite these complaints, I have seen much worse in that department.
I have a hard time putting this next one into words. The world feels small. There are no connections that reach into the world beyond the core plot and its actors. This ensures a fast pace but even tho I generally enjoy fast pacing, in this case, it makes it hard for me to buy into the world itself because there is nothing to buy into there. There basically is no general worldbuilding at all.… (plus d'informations)

After giving the first book the benefit of the doubt and because it was more an introduction to the cast this second book just hadn't enough to offer to keep me interested.
It mostly just did more of the same.
In regards to the perceived world size, this book did a bit better but overall it just felt too scripted and forced to be believable.
This book, again, suffers from very stupid bad guys and a lot of convenient coincidences.
On top of that, it started unnecessary foreshadowing via visions which almost always just hurts the story.
It seems like it just imitates a lot of things seen in similar successful books without fully understanding what those tools are meant to accomplish.
Most of the shortcomings of this book and the one before probably are only so visible to me because I have read lots of books in this genre.
I can imagine people having a blast without a lot of prior experience in the urban fantasy area but for me, it just wasn't enough.… (plus d'informations)