Genre:
Paranormal/ Fantasy/ Supernatural
Description:
“After
the death of their parents, Ethan Harlow and his sister do their best
to pick up the pieces and live a normal life, but after an attack
that leaves Ethan in the ICU, their lives quickly become anything but
normal.
After Ethan
notices strange changes in himself, he sets off across California to
find an answer, a name for what he has become. Unfortunately
what he finds is far worse than anything he could have imagined. A centuries
old evil waiting to return, a race of creatures that shouldn’t
exist and war Ethan never meant to start.
With the
help of his new friends and the woman that made him, Ethan must make
a choice…
Will he run
for his life? Or stay and fight at the side of the wolves that have
become like a family to him?”
“Penelope
A. Sweet is a lifelong believer in magic and monsters, and it’s this
belief that drives her to search within the shadows for the darkest
of tales. A lover of all things horror and all things macabre,
Penelope’s passion is to bring you the stories that send chills
down your spine, keep you awake in the night and most of all keep you
coming back for more.”
Appraisal:
It is hard
to know where to start with this review. I am generally a lover of
shifter stories and in the beginning I felt like this one had
potential. Perhaps with a good copy or line editor this novel could
turn into a great story. First thing I would do is tone down the
wimpy main character, Ethan. I almost wanted to throw my Kindle
against the wall if I read the line “I wish I understood what was
going on” or knew what was happening or similar statements.
Honestly, I could understand his confusion without having to read
those words over and over again throughout the entire story! The poor
boy was not very smart, but I could have dealt with him being a wimp.
However, the problems escalated when his dialogue was always
chuckled. Not only his but most of the other characters chuckled
their lines as well. Should I add here that this is not a comedy? I
didn’t feel like the chuckling dialogue lightened the mood either.
Another
fact that didn’t sit well with me was that Ethan’s maker
abandoned him after changing him. She left him on his own for a good
three months for him to deal with his “change” on his own. Later
we learn his maker, Sam, is over two hundred years old and was now
the leader of her own group that was made up of other lost ‘pups’.
How much sense does that make? I felt that was totally nonsensical
and I couldn’t justify that in my head at all. It is little wonder
that Ethan caused the problems that escalated this story to a war
between two totally different werewolf clans that ran on different
philosophies. This was a unique story idea that ran into problems
without a proper editor, story critique group, or beta readers who
are not friends, to guide the author.
These
applied elements would have also helped with proofing errors I
encountered. Several were missing or wrong words such as
there/they’re, read/red, wondering/wandering, thought/though, and
gentile/gentle, but the most disturbing for me was Matt being
spelled out as Mattes too many times to mention. Once he was even
Mat.
So
basically I felt there was a good story in all the words, somewhere.
Several twists give the book a nice pace. Also, the characters are
interesting and diverse. The story needs some work to reach its full
potential though. I should also mention Wolves
Among Men ends in a
cliff-hanger, but the good news is that book two, Unleashed,
is now available.
FYI:
Wolves
Among Men is the first book in
the Saga of Wolves
series. Book two, Unleashed,
is also now available. Only two F-bombs were dropped.
Format/Typo
Issues:
Way too
many proofing issues for anyone’s comfort.
Rating:
** Two Stars
Reviewed
by: ?wazithinkin
Approximate
word count: 85-90,000 words
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