Shannon C.’s review of Moon Called (Mercy Thompson, Book 1) by Patricia Briggs
Urban fantasy released by Ace 31 Jan 06
I know what you’re thinking. You are no doubt thinking to yourself, ‘What took you so long to start the Mercy Thompson books, Shannon?’ And you would be right. They have only been recommended to me on numerous occasions by lots of people, most notably Gwen, who, upon my random squeeing about this book over at Duckie Central, laughed and pointed me to her reviews of the rest of the series and implied that I might not have been paying sufficient attention to her great taste in books. Well, if they’re all this good, I will never doubt Gwen again.
What works really well for me is Mercy herself. In a word, I love her. You know how in some books they tell you over and over that the heroine has a big heart? Yeah, well, we see that firsthand. Mercy is loyal to her friends, and is willing to do whatever she needs to in order to help them. And it’s that big-heartedness that made me a Mercy fangirl. She also seems fairly smart, and doesn’t just wade in with her size nines the way some urban fantasy heroines seem to. I even bought the love triangle, because I really did believe that Mercy cared about the two men she’s going to have to choose between, and there was no silly, “Oh, now why would you be interested in li’l ol’ me?” antics on her part.
I also felt the world-building was superb. I liked that the implications of how supernatural creatures would be treated if they came out of the closet were explored in greater detail. And the werewolf and vampire politics and maneuvering were fascinating.
This book wasn’t quite a keeper for me — I put it down fairly easily a time or two — but I did stay up way too late trying to finish it, and now I have the rest of the series to look forward to reading. Thankfully, there are only two other Mercy-centered books, so it’s possible I will actually manage to catch up before a new Mercy book comes out.
Grade: B+
Summary:
Mercy Thompson’s life is not exactly normal. Her next-door neighbor is a werewolf. Her former boss is a gremlin. And she’s fixing a VW bus for a vampire. But then, Mercy isn’t exactly normal herself.
Read an excerpt.
This is, by far, my favorite Urban Fantasy series. I just love Mercy and the world she lives in! And her men. We can’t forget about her men.
Love this series. Mercy is such a likable character.
I’ve always felt sad hearing about the hype for Briggs because I couldn’t get past the first book. I dunno, I found the first chapter really exposition-heavy, and the plot itself, well, by the time I got to the end I was under the impression that the whole problem could have been avoided with a single conversation between two of the characters.
Do the later books get better?
I just started the first book. It has really good page turning parts and some slow parts as well.