Dead Ever After / Charlaine Harris

4 out of 5 stars

Sookie Stackhouse finds it easy to turn down the request of former barmaid Arlene when she wants her job back at Merlotte’s. After all, Arlene tried to have Sookie killed. But her relationship with Eric Northman is not so clearcut. He and his vampires are keeping their distance…and a cold silence. And when Sookie learns the reason why, she is devastated.

Then a shocking murder rocks Bon Temps, and Sookie is arrested for the crime.

But the evidence against Sookie is weak, and she makes bail. Investigating the killing, she’ll learn that what passes for truth in Bon Temps is only a convenient lie. What passes for justice is more spilled blood. And what passes for love is never enough...

2019 Re-Read

I have been heard to say (not seriously, but when having a hissy fit) that when a woman is done with a man, he should die. That would be how he knew that the relationship was over. Now, may I also say that I’ve never enforced this idea of mine, it was temporary insanity after the end of a particularly frustrating pseudo-relationship. But it would seem that Sookie agrees with me:

“In books, the hero was gone after the big blowup. He didn’t stick around in the vicinity doing mysterious shit, sending messages to the heroine by a third party. He hauled his ass into oblivion. And that was the way things should be, as far as I was concerned. Life should imitate romance literature far more often.”

I anticipated this ending practically from the first book. It’s not how I would have ended the series, but I was just the reader, not the writer. I’m proclaiming my undying love for Bill! But that’s just me. When I read this series the first time, I read the last three books in a frantic binge. As a result, I didn’t remember a lot of details, so it was pleasant to read a little slower this time around and soak in the final moments of a pleasurable series. I have absolutely no doubt that I will read this series again at some point, but now I hope to get on with other books, due at the library in a few days.

Bill forever, y'all.

Deadlocked / Charlaine Harris

4 out of 5 stars

Growing up with telepathic abilities, Sookie Stackhouse realized early on that there are things she'd rather not know. An now that she's an adult, she also realizes that some things she knows about, she'd rather not see--like Eric Northman feeding off another woman. A younger one.

There's a thing or two she'd like to say about that, but she has to keep quiet--Felipe de Castro, the vampire king of Louisiana (and Arkansas and Nevada), is in town. It's the worst possible time for a human body to show up in Eric's front yard--especially the body of the woman whose blood he just drank.

Now it's up to Sookie and Bill, the official Area Five investigator, to solve the murder. Sookie thinks that, at least this time, the dead girl's fate has nothing to do with her. But she is wrong. She has an enemy, one far more devious than she would ever suspect, who's set out to make Sookie's world come crashing down.

2019 Re-Read

Sookie is trying to wish away some aspects of her life and makes the mistake of asking Bill about his favourite fantasy:

“My favorite fantasy? You come down into my daytime resting place stark naked," he said, and I could see the gleam of his teeth as he smiled. "Oh, wait," Bill said. "That's already happened.”
“And that's your fantasy? That I come into your house naked and have sex with you?"
"After that, you tell me that you have sent Eric on his way, that you want to be mine forever, and that to share my life you will permit me to make you a vampire like me."
The silence now was thick, and the fun had drained out of the fantasy.
Then Bill added, "You know what I'd say when you told me this? I'd tell you I would never do such a thing. Because I love you.”

This is where Bill proves to me that he understands Sookie perfectly. He knows that she’s a creature of the sun and would never be happy in the darkness of the undead world. And that he still loves her.

It’s Sookie’s birthday, and she receives a delegation of the undead when darkness falls:

“We came to wish you a happy day,” Eric said. “And I suppose, as usual, Bill will want to express his undying love that surpasses my love, as he’ll tell you—and Pam will want to say something sarcastic and nearly painful, while reminding you that she loves you, too.”
Bill and Pam looked decidedly miffed at Eric’s preemptive strike, but I wasn’t going to let anything dim my mood.
“And what about you, Eric?” I asked on counterattack. “Are you going to tell me that you love me just as much as Bill, but in a practical way, while finding some way to subtly threaten me and simultaneously remind me that you may be leaving with Freyda?”

Once again, Pam is perfect: “Sookie, I brought you something too. I never thought I’d want to spend time with a human, but you’re more tolerable than most.”

There’s also a showdown with Freyda, the Queen who is courting Eric. She visits Sookie to size up her competition. Bubba is perfect as her guide—when she asks what people see in Ms. Stackhouse, the normally addled Bubba speaks right up, telling Freyda that Sookie is kind. And that’s it in a nutshell. She’s kind to everyone who allows it—even when they don’t really deserve it. Forget being a Christian, Sookie, you’re working on being a good Buddhist.

Almost there—I will be free of this re-reading trap with one more book!

Dead Reckoning / Charlaine Harris

4 out of 5 stars

With her knack for being in trouble's way, Sookie witnesses the firebombing of Merlotte's, the bar where she works. Since Sam Merlotte is now known to be two-natured, suspicion falls immediately on the anti-shifters in the area. Sookie suspects otherwise, but her attention is divided when she realizes that her lover Eric Northman and his "child" Pam are plotting to kill the vampire who is now their master. Gradually, Sookie is drawn into the plot-which is much more complicated than she knows...

2019 Re-Read

You can get whiplash trying to keep up with Sookie Stackhouse’s life—one day you’re planning a vampire assassination, the next it’s a mundane baby shower. One evening you hand out sharpened stakes, the next cake and napkins.

This is the volume of the series where Sookie realizes how much her life has changed—how much she has changed. For several books now, Sookie has noted that she’s a “bad Christian.” Now she knows where her telepathic talent comes from (an indiscretion of her grandmother’s) and her world has expanded to include all sorts of supernatural creatures. She has left behind her “nice girl next door” persona and is becoming a woman to be conjured with.

It’s inevitable that this will change her relationship with Eric, who is used to being the vampire in charge. He’s getting surly and pouty, not liking this change in his ‘wife.’ She’s standing up for herself and for others, something that controlling spouses find disconcerting.

I amazed, actually, at how many human relationship issues that Harris manages to tackle through this urban fantasy soap-opera. As Sookie learns more about herself and managing her feelings & expectations, we all get to review these life lessons through her interior monologue. How often women are expected to ‘be nice’ and acquiesce to the demands of men, plus how they get labelled as bitches when they don’t follow this script.

Still loving Pam, still carrying a torch for Bill, really appreciating Bubba.

Dead in the Family / Charlaine Harris

4 stars out of 5

Sookie Stackhouse is dealing with a whole host of family problems, ranging from her own kin (a non-human fairy and a telepathic second cousin) demanding a place in her life, to her lover Eric's vampire sire, an ancient being who arrives with Eric's 'brother' in tow at a most inopportune moment. And Sookie's tracking down a distant relation of her ailing neighbour (and ex), Vampire Bill Compton.

In addition to the multitude of family issues complicating her life, the werewolf pack of Shreveport has asked Sookie for a special favour, and since Sookie is an obliging young woman, she agrees. But this favour for the wolves has dire results for Sookie, who is still recovering from the trauma of her abduction during the Fairy War.

2019 Re-Read

The “Pam is Awesome” volume.

'Pam. Listen.'
'The phone is pressed to my ear. Speak.'
'Appius Livius Ocella just dropped in.'
'Fuck a zombie!”

This is the book where Pam becomes my favourite vampire (though Bill is still in the running). I love the deadpan lines that Harris writes for this cold blonde.

As in this conversation between Sookie and Pam:

Pam: “How is Eric?'

Sookie: 'Very tightly wound. Plus, a lot of stuff happened that he'll tell you about.'
Pam: 'Thanks for the warning. I'll go to the house now. You're my favorite breather.'
Sookie: 'Oh. Well ... great.'
She hung up.”

Dead and Gone / Charlaine Harris

4 out of 5 stars

The vamps have been out for years, and now the weres and shifters have decided to follow the lead of the undead and reveal their existence to the ordinary world. Sookie Stackhouse already knows about them, of course - her brother turns into a panther at the full moon, she's friend to the local were pack, and Sam, her boss at Merlotte's bar, is a shapeshifter.

The great revelation goes well at first - then the horribly mutilated body of a were-panther is found in the parking lot of Merlotte's, and Sookie agrees to use her telepathic talent to track down the murderer. But there is a far greater danger than this killer threatening Bon Temps: a race of unhuman beings, older, more powerful, and far more secretive than the vampires or the werewolves, is preparing for war. And Sookie is an all-too-human pawn in their ages-old battle...

2019 Re-Read

“I added to my mental list of the odd things I'd done that day. I'd entertained the police, sunbathed, visited at a mall with some fairies, weeded, and killed someone. Now it was powdered-corpse removal time. And the day wasn't over yet.”

I’m enjoying the inherent humour in this series. Harris knows that she’s writing soap opera story lines and she’s enjoying it. Especially when Sookie arms herself to deal with malevolent fairies—with a garden trowel and a squirt gun of lemon juice! And Sookie saying to herself, “What had set the fae world off? I’d never seen one. Now you couldn’t throw a trowel without hitting a fairy.”

And once again, I’m carrying a torch for Bill:

“As I watched Bill, waiting with apparent calm for death to come to him, I had a flash of him as I'd known him: the first vampire I'd ever met, the first man I'd ever gone to bed with, the first suitor I'd ever loved. Everything that followed had tainted those memories, but for one moment I saw him clearly, and I loved him again.”

From Dead to Worse / Charlaine Harris

4 out of 5 stars

After the natural disaster of Hurricane Katrina and the manmade explosion at the vampire summit, everyone human and otherwise is stressed, including Louisiana cocktail waitress Sookie Stackhouse, who is trying to cope with the fact that her boyfriend Quinn has gone missing.

It's clear that things are changing whether the weres and vamps of her corner of Louisiana like it or not. And Sookie, Friend to the Pack and blood-bonded to Eric Northman, leader of the local vampire community is caught up in the changes.

In the ensuing battles, Sookie faces danger, death, and once more, betrayal by someone she loves. And when the fur has finished flying and the cold blood finished flowing, her world will be forever altered.

2019 Re-Read

”The security light made me feel safe, though I knew that was an illusion. If there's light, you can just see what's coming for you a little more clearly.”

How true! We all try to arrange our lives to keep ourselves safe and sound, but in reality we have little control over those matters. But as John Lennon wrote, “Life is what happens to you while you’re busy making other plans.” Ms. Stackhouse could write a dissertation on this subject.

This is the volume where I fell in love with Bill Compton. Yes, he’s a vampire, so inherently untrustworthy, but I just love that fact that he stays in Sookie’s life and just keeps on quietly being her friend and admirer. I adore his loyalty.

All Together Dead / Charlaine Harris

4 out of 5 stars

Louisiana cocktail waitress Sookie Stackhouse has her hands full dealing with every sort of undead and paranormal creature imaginable. And after being betrayed by her longtime vampire love, Sookie must not only deal with a new man in her life—the shapeshifter Quinn—but also contend with the long-planned vampire summit.

The summit is a tense situation. The vampire queen of Louisiana is in a precarious position, her power base weakened by hurricane damage to New Orleans. And there are some vamps who would like to finish what nature started. Soon, Sookie must decide what side she'll stand with. And her choice may mean the difference between survival and all-out catastrophe.

2019 Re-Read

Another evening, another Sookie Stackhouse book. At least I managed to cook some dinner last night, although my kitchen is still a mess. I have to find a way out of this groove I have found myself in—there are other things I need to be reading and other tasks that need my attention. But I may only find the way out by finishing up this series as a re-read.

I’ve always felt that this is the book where Sookie proves that she has good judgment—she seems to understand the plots and conspiracies of the vamp world better than they do, perhaps because she’s an outsider to that world and able to observe it dispassionately. This talent of hers, which Eric calls “thinking outside the box,” attracts unwanted attention from the Queen and her sidekick, Andre. Staying unbound to them is proving difficult. Instead, she ends up bound to Eric the Uncertain.

Eric runs hot and cold towards Sookie, unwilling to admit that he’s unusually attracted to a human woman. It seems kind of like the men who’d like to sleep with a woman but don’t want to be seen with her in public. Good for Sookie, standing up for herself and her right to be acknowledged.

I think just about everyone has been unappreciated at a job at some point in their life. Sookie gets her moment of this as she holds a bomb that she’s scared to set down, waiting for the bomb squad to show up, talking to a bystander about her status in the vamp scene:

”Ha,” I said. “Oh, ha-ha. Yeah, ‘cause they love me. You see how many vampires are up here? Zero, right?”
“One,” said Eric, stepping out of the stairwell.

Lots of foreshadowing for upcoming installments. On to book 8, From Dead to Worse this evening.

Definitely Dead / Charlaine Harris

4 out of 5 stars

Since Louisiana cocktail waitress Sookie Stackhouse has so few living relatives, she hates to lose one - even her cousin Hadley, undead consort of the vampire Queen of Louisiana. Hadley's left everything she has to Sookie, but claiming that inheritance has a high risk factor. Some people don't want her looking too deeply into Hadley's past, or Hadley's possessions. And they're prepared to do anything in their power to stop her. Whoever it is, they're definitely dangerous - and Sookie's life is definitely on the line...

2019 Re-Read

You know, I have library books that I can’t renew and that I should be reading. My kitchen is in chaos and I had cornflakes for supper last night. My to-do list is as long as my arm. And yet, I’m re-reading this series instead of doing any of that. Je ne regrette rien.

This is the heart-break volume, when Sookie finds out that she’s based a lot of ideas about her life on shifting sands—and doesn’t know what is exactly true any more.

“I’d been blindsided with the most painful knowledge: the first man to ever say he loved me had never loved me at all. His passion had been artificial. His pursuit of me had been choreographed.”

To add insult to injury, she is informed by an ancient vampire that she has fairy heritage and that is her big attraction for vampires, who are to fairies what cats are to catnip. He doesn’t even realize that he’s kicking her when she’s down. Quinn has entered stage right at exactly the right to time sooth Sookie’s wounded pride.

Despite the emotional turmoil and unending vampiric politics, Sookie has to deal with her doubly-deceased cousin’s belongings. During the clean-up of Hadley’s apartment, she discovers yet another body-in-a-closet.

“Was this the second body I'd found in the closet, or the third? I wondered why I even opened closet doors any more.”

At least she comes out of these events with a female friend, Amelia, plus some credit with the Queen of Louisiana. She’s going to need both.

Dead as a Doornail / Charlaine Harris

4 out of 5 stars

Small-town cocktail waitress Sookie Stackhouse has had more than her share of experience with the supernatural—but now it’s really hitting close to home. When Sookie sees her brother Jason’s eyes start to change, she knows he’s about to turn into a were-panther for the first time—a transformation he embraces more readily than most shapeshifters she knows. But her concern becomes cold fear when a sniper sets his deadly sights on the local changeling population, and Jason’s new panther brethren suspect he may be the shooter. Now, Sookie has until the next full moon to find out who’s behind the attacks—unless the killer decides to find her first…

2019 Re-Read

Just as telepath Sookie enjoys resting her mind around Vampire Bill, whose thoughts she can’t hear, I enjoy resting myself in this series that I’ve read and enjoyed before.

I’ve been consuming this series at a furious rate, seeing details that I just didn’t see on my first pass through. I believe that this is the volume where the private investigators show up to question Sookie, and we get an intersection between this series and Harris’ Lily Bard series. When I first read this book, I hadn’t been introduced to Lily yet, so this was a fun little detail. [It may have been the previous volume—I’m sucking back 2 books per evening right now and they are getting a bit blended in my memory].

However, on my first reading I certainly did see the assumptions of the men in Sookie’s life—they assume that she’s going to be open & interested in them, that they can easily manipulate her, and that when they speak she has to listen. And, as women, when we resist these assumptions, we are labelled as bitches. (Now I’m going to recommend a non-fiction book to you, The Gift of Fear: Survival Signals That Protect Us from Violence—I think every woman should read it and every man who has a woman in his life who he cares about should too just to know what it’s like to be female in our world.)

They say when one door shuts, another one opens. But they haven’t been living at my house. Most of the doors I open seem to have something scary crouched behind them, anyway.

Club Dead / Charlaine Harris

4 out of 5 stars

Things between cocktail waitress Sookie and her vampire boyfriend Bill seem to be going excellently (apart from the small matter of him being undead) until he leaves town for a while. A long while. Bill's sinister boss Eric has an idea of where to find him, whisking her off to Jackson, Mississippi to mingle with the under-underworld at Club Dead. When she finally catches up with the errant vampire, he is in big trouble and caught in an act of serious betrayal. This raises serious doubts as to whether she should save him or start sharpening a few stakes of her own ..

2019 Re-Read

Just as telepath Sookie enjoys resting her mind around Vampire Bill, whose thoughts she can’t hear, I enjoy resting myself in this series that I’ve read and enjoyed before.

Although Sookie spends a lot of time in this book rescuing Bill, despite the fact that he’s a lying, two-timing vampire, I like it because she finally takes ownership of herself. She starts to realize that she’s being played: Half of me (pathetically) wanted to let him know I'd kept the faith; half of me wanted to get in the toolshed and sharpen me some stakes. Yes, Sookie, I think we’ve all “sharpened some stakes,” in our fantasies!

“They found the corpse in the closet of Alcide's apartment, and they hatched a plan to hide his remains." Eric sounded like that had been kind of cute of us.

"My Sookie hid a corpse?"

"I don't think you can be too sure about that possessive pronoun."

"Where did you learn that term, Northman?"

"I took 'English as a Second Language' at a community college in the seventies.”

Also:

Bill said, "She is mine."

I wondered if my hands would move. They would. I raised both of them, making an unmistakable one-fingered gesture. Eric laughed, and Bill said "Sookie!" in shocked admonishment.

"I think that Sookie is telling us she belongs to herself," Eric said softly.”

Oh how clearly Harris shows us how complicated our relationships are and how badly we can be hurt when they go awry.

Living Dead in Dallas / Charlaine Harris

4 out of 5 stars

Cocktail waitress Sookie Stackhouse is having a streak of bad luck. First her co-worker is killed, and no one seems to care. Then she comes face-to-face with a beastly creature which gives her a painful and poisonous lashing. Enter the vampires, who graciously suck the poison from her veins (like they didn't enjoy it).
The point is: they saved her life. So when one of the bloodsuckers asks for a favour, she obliges - and soon Sookie's in Dallas, using her telepathic skills to search for a missing vampire. She's supposed to interview certain humans involved, but she makes one condition: the vampires must promise to behave, and let the humans go unharmed.
But that's easier said than done, and all it takes is one delicious blonde and one small mistake for things to turn deadly...

2019 Re-Read

Just as telepath Sookie enjoys resting her mind around Vampire Bill, whose thoughts she can’t hear, I enjoy resting myself in this series that I’ve read and enjoyed before.

I find myself really curious about Charlaine Harris’ writing practices—did she have this series planned out well in advance or did she just sit down at her desk each day to see where the characters took her? Maybe a hybrid somewhere in between? I feel like the general arc of the story must have been laid out in advance, but then some characters (the maenad, for example) just seem to appear without warning or explanation.

But Harris delivers some on-the-nose commentary about American society, despite the supernatural elements. Take for example the lawyer Hugo that Sookie is teamed-up with to investigate the Fellowship of the Sun:

I could tell Hugo was convinced that he would get to walk back up these stairs: after all, he was a civilized person. These were all civilized people.

Hugo really couldn't imagine that anything irreparable could happen to him, because he was a middle-class white American with a college education, as were all the people on the stairs with us.

I had no such conviction. I was not a wholly civilized person.

I’ve made assumptions like this—that life is safe and that bad things won’t happen. It’s these little observations that make this series more than just fluff. Just as Agatha Christie’s Jane Marple could gauge people from her village experience, Sookie has good psychological experience from being a woman, a telepath, and a bar maid in a small town. It’s true what they say, that everybody knows your business in a small town and this gives anyone who is paying attention a chance to educate themselves in the field of human behaviour!

Dead Until Dark / Charlaine Harris

4 out of 5 stars

Sookie Stackhouse is just a small-time cocktail waitress in small-town Louisiana. Until the vampire of her dreams walks into her life-and one of her coworkers checks out....

Maybe having a vampire for a boyfriend isn't such a bright idea.

2019 Re-Read

I don’t know how other people handle stress, but my favourite diversion is to re-read books that I know that I will enjoy. When my life is uncertain, I love the certainty of an entertaining book. So, as I prepare for major life changes, I picked up Dead Until Dark a few nights ago and found myself completely immersed in the life of Sookie Stackhouse in Bon Temps, Louisiana. How can you not have a good time in a town called Good Times? It’s silly, soap-opera type fun.

Since Sookie knows a thing or two about life changes, I started to wonder if that wasn’t why I had zeroed in on this particular series. In this very first book, we meet her when she is still an ordinary person. Or at least as ordinary as a telepathic bar maid in a small town can be. This is the first installment of the changes that open up her life, giving her access to a whole new world that she hadn’t previously been aware of.

I love the very first sentence: I’d been waiting for the vampire for years when he walked into the bar. Well, I’ve been waiting for years for retirement and I will achieve it shortly. As I watch Sookie change and adapt as her world opens up, I feel like I can change and adapt too, and adjust to this new reality.

Innkeeper Chronicles / Ilona Andrews

March 2019 Re-Read

When life is getting me down, I turn to Ilona Andrews.  I powered through the Hidden Legacy series and still needed an infusion of light-hearted fun and fantasy.  Enter the Innkeeper Chronicles.  I debated long and hard before I sank my cash into these volumes, but I’m so glad that I did.  There’s nothing like Dina, Caldenia, Sean, and Arland to make me smile and feel better.  I am so relating to Dina missing her parents right now—my mother’s last sibling passed away at the end of January and I am missing her, my parents and all the other aunts & uncles.  Spending time in Red Deer, Texas, helps me feel a little less lonely.

So yes, I’m avoiding life right now and re-reading old favourites.  I’m not sure when this tendency will end, but I’m enjoying my vacation from reality.

Hidden Legacy Series / Ilona Andrews

 March 2019 Re-Read

When life is getting me down, I turn to Ilona Andrews. Particularly the Hidden Legacy series. There’s some strange alchemy in this series which just makes me feel better. The closeness of the Baylor family when I’m missing my family dreadfully. Nevada’s dedication to her company when my work situation is feeling less than ideal. The relationship between Nevada and Rogan when I haven’t seen my guy for longer than usual. Sometimes I’m stunned at how much I enjoy the extreme violence in the books, but that also seems to be a peaceful way for me to purge my own desire to punch people.

I love this fantasy world—the magic, the Houses, the dialog, Nevada’s internal commentary, the Baylor family, all of it. I’m so glad that the Andrews decided to continue on with a Catalina series, which I am awaiting impatiently.

So yes, I’m avoiding life right now and re-reading old favourites. I’m not sure when this tendency will end, but I’m enjoying my vacation from reality.

Bayou Moon / Ilona Andrews

3.5 stars out of 5

The Edge lies between worlds, on the border between the Broken, where people shop at Walmart and magic is a fairytale–and the Weird, where blueblood aristocrats rule, changelings roam, and the strength of your magic can change your destiny…

Cerise Mar and her unruly clan are cash poor but land rich, claiming a large swathe of the Mire, the Edge swamplands between the state of Louisiana and the Weird. When her parents vanish, her clan’s long-time rivals are suspect number one.

But all is not as it seems. Two nations of the Weird are waging a cold war fought by feint and espionage, and their conflict is about to spill over into the Edge—and Cerise’s life . William, a changeling soldier who left behind the politics of the Weird, has been forced back into service to track down a rival nation’s spymaster.

When William’s and Cerise’s missions lead them to cross paths, sparks fly—but they’ll have to work together if they want to succeed…and survive.

One of the main things that I love about the Andrews’ female main characters is that they are very self-sufficient & competent to run their lives. They are acknowledged to be high functioning people by their families & circles of friends. Not only can they handle the vicissitudes of life, they can defend themselves and their dependents.

Another reason that I love their books? The humour. In this book, when Cerise and William first meet, they are both “undercover.” She thinks he’s an ass and secretly calls him Lord Leatherpants. She is smelling rather pungent, and William not-so-secretly calls her the Hobo Queen.

William leaned forward and pointed at the river. “I don’t know why you rolled in spaghetti sauce,” he said in a confidential voice. “I don’t really care. But that water over there won’t hurt you. Try washing it off.”
She stuck her tongue out.
“Maybe after you’re clean,” he said.
Her eyes widened. She stared at him for a long moment. A little crazy spark lit up in her dark irises.
She raised her finger, licked it, and rubbed some dirt off her forehead.
Now what?
The girl showed him her stained finger and reached toward him slowly, aiming for his face.
“No,” William said. “Bad hobo.”

There are, of course, the obligatory rocks in the romance road. As Shakespeare told us, true love never did run smooth. But that line is from Midsummer Night’s Dream and the plot line of this story is more Taming of the Shrew.

Silver Borne / Patricia Briggs

4 out of 5 stars

Mercy is smart enough to realize that when it comes to the magical fae, the less you know, the better. But you can't always get what you want. When she attempts to return a powerful fae she previously borrowed in an act of desperation, she finds the bookstore locked up and closed down.

It seems the book contains secrets - and the fae will do just about anything to keep it out of the wrong hands. And if that doesn't take enough of Mercy's attention, her friend Samuel is struggling with his wolf side - leaving Mercy to cover for him lest his own father declare Samuel's life forfeit.

All in all, Mercy has had better days. And if she isn't careful, she may not have many more...

2018 Re-read:

I felt quite different this time around reading The Silver Borne.  I’m willing to give it a full 4 stars, without reservation.  I also enjoyed the Fae-ness of this installment much more this time around.  Which brings me back to a thesis of mine, that some books need to be given second chances, when I’m in a different mood.

I’m still impatient will all the books that depict women’s relationships as competitive, rather than cooperative.  Perhaps because I’ve encountered more collegial or friendly relationships with the women in my life, rather than competitiveness.  There are always a slim minority of women who aren’t supportive, but I find far, far more who are willing to work together on things.  If there’s more of this female competitiveness out there than I run into, I am most glad that I’ve got a better situation.

I am now declaring myself slump-free, this book having been the last step needed to rekindle my love of reading.

Bone Crossed / Patricia Briggs

4 out of 5 stars

Marsilia, the local Vampire Queen, has learned that Mercy crossed her by slaying a member of her clan—and she's out for blood. But since Mercy is protected from direct reprisal by the werewolf pack (and her close relationship with its sexy Alpha), it won't be Mercy's blood Marsilia is after.

It'll be her friends'.

2018 Re-read:

One of my favourite Mercy Thompson novels!  Lots of vampire drama, but most importantly we get to know Stefan better.  Is it wrong that I still wish Mercy had chosen him rather than Adam?  Mercy gets to really draw on her skinwalker powers, proving once again that being a growly werewolf is not necessarily as tough as the wily coyote!  (BTW, I saw a big fluffy coyote over the Xmas holidays, and thought of Ms. Thompson).

Re-reading this series has really re-set my internal reading-metre.  I’m enjoying myself again, recovering from a potential reading slump before it really got hold of me.  Thank you, Ms. Briggs, for giving me that oomph to escape the downward pull of the book-slump-undertow!

Blood Bound / Patricia Briggs

4 out of 5 stars

Mechanic Mercy Thompson has friends in low places-and in dark ones. And now she owes one of them a favor. Since she can shapeshift at will, she agrees to act as some extra muscle when her vampire friend Stefan goes to deliver a message to another of his kind.

But this new vampire is hardly ordinary-and neither is the demon inside of him.

As I continue my reading journey down memory lane, I realize that right here in book two is where Patricia Briggs and I go separate ways regarding who we want to see Mercy shacked up with. This was the book that to me said, “Go vampires! Stefan all the way!”

You see, I’m just not into being bossed around. Eldest child, bossy in my own right, don’t need to butt heads with some stubborn werewolf every damn day. In fact, every now and then, my gentleman friend will ask me, “Not a vampire yet?” Now I think he mostly asks just to get me to nibble his neck, but he has obviously been studying my bookshelves and has recognized a significant theme.

I’m not sure what the lure of the vampire dark side is for me. But it’s there and I plan to indulge it again in 2019.

Moon Called / Patricia Briggs

4 out of 5 stars

Mercedes Thompson, aka Mercy, is a talented Volkswagen mechanic living in the Tri-Cities area of Washington. She also happens to be a walker, a magical being with the power to shift into a coyote at will. Mercy's next-door neighbor is a werewolf. Her former boss is a gremlin. And she's fixing a bus for a vampire. This is the world of Mercy Thompson, one that looks a lot like ours but is populated by those things that go bump in the night. And Mercy's connection to those things is about to get her into some serious hot water...

I’m not sure why this is a more difficult Christmas season than usual, but it is.  I’m having a hard time motivating myself to do anything besides the basics:  go to work, cook enough to survive, clean when I have to.  I didn’t even set up a Christmas tree this year—and I’ve done that continuously since 1996.  Plus I’ve found myself reluctant to read new books and I’ve gone on quite a binge of re-reading old favourites.

This one I am justifying to myself as a re-read in anticipation of the 11^th book of the series coming out next May.  I’m just having a wander down memory lane, since this is one of the books that got me hooked on the urban fantasy genre.

I’d forgotten how quickly Briggs developed the plot in this first novel—the reader plummets into convoluted politics of various species, equally twisty personal relationships, plus lots & lots of details that set up the Mercy universe.  I was enthralled during that first encounter and have been happily sharing Briggs’ world since 2015.

I was somewhat startled to realize that Mercy was already crushing on Adam, right from the beginning!  Somehow, in my mind, the triangle between her, Adam, and Samuel started with the two men on more or less equal footing.  This is changing my view of Mercy—I like her better for knowing her own desires and not letting Samuel interfere (too much).

I really like Briggs’ depiction of the Fae and her version of vampires.  I’m still very glad I started reading this genre and I look forward to many more urban fantasy adventures in 2019.