Book Review: Moon Called

Moon Called (Mercy Thompson #1)

By: Patricia Briggs

Published By: Ace

Publication Date: January 2006

Page Count: 288

Buy it at Amazon, Barnes & Noble, or IndieBound

Source: Purchased by Reviewer

Audience: Adult - Urban Fantasy

I think that the cover for Moon Called promises a slightly different book than you end up with. I read this fully expecting it to be a little sexy, maybe like a Kresley Cole or Richelle Mead book... it wasn’t. Actually, I think that Moon Called has a similar feel to the Sookie Stackhouse books by Charlaine Harris. The main difference being that I actually thought Mercy (Mercedes) Thompson had a little more about her than Sookie.

Mercy is a bit of an outsider. She was raised by a pack of werewolves, but she wasn’t a member of the pack because she’s a coyote shapeshifter. That means she is dismissed and disliked by most werewolves, and she has learned to be resourceful. Mercy is independent and subtly feisty... my kind of heroine! She doesn’t like to be dragged into pack affairs, but when a boy she tries to help ends up dead, she is sucked in anyway.

What unfolds is a bit of a mystery, which Mercy helps to figure out. It’s a little complicated and pulls in not one but two packs of werewolves, and adds an amusing sideline in growling dominant males to the story. I liked both Samuel and Adam, but what I really liked was Mercy’s refusal to be claimed by either. She’s her own woman, and not prepared to put up with being treated as inferior. I enjoyed reading the wolf body language of submission and dominance as hierarchies were threatened, and for the most part I kept up with who was who, in a fairly large cast of well written characters. Towards the end I did start to struggle with keeping everything straight though, and I wasn’t completely convinced that Mercy needed to put herself quite so directly in harm’s way... a little like how Sookie Stackhouse gets dragged into things by accident.

Overall, I’d say I found this a really enjoyable read, with plenty of scope for the future. There wasn’t much by way of romance at all, but I think that the next book will probably deliver on that front and I’ll be reading it soon. This would be a good book for Sookie fans looking for a new read to dig into. 

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.