I decided to succumb to the impulse to binge a little on Kelley Armstrong books this week, so I hied myself to the library to check out Men of the Otherworld
First things first: the title is a bit misleading. This isn't a book about the men of the Otherworld. It's a book about the recent (1940s-present) history of the major members of the American werewolf Pack. Yes, that means men, but primarily Pack Alpha Jeremy Danvers and his adopted son Clay, with a bit about his father Malcolm and the other Pack characters. None of the other major male characters she's introduced in the series. Not even the other (originally) non-Pack werewolf Karl Marsten. This isn't actually a big problem storywise; I think Armstrong does better when she focuses more tightly on one or two races and characters rather than skittering around between several, as in Living with the Dead.
Most of the book consists of reprints of three stories Armstrong had published online over the last few years: the novellas "Savage" and "Ascension" and the short story "Infusion." There's also one new present-day story, "Kitsunegari," that clears up some of the mysteries about Jeremy's maternal background in "Infusion." I'd read all but that last story online at Armstrong's website, so this isn't new material for me, but I enjoyed rereading them all in rapid sequence. Within the book, they're all run together. Each chapter within the novellas is individually titled, so it's not clear except from the time-jumps where the separate parts begin and end. The "Savage" sections are particularly entertaining, since they are written from the perspective of Clay as a young boy, already a werewolf and with a particularly wolf-like perspective on life and other people. ("It was already dead!") All but "Kitsunegari" flow together quite well; the shift in narrator to the relatively serene Jeremy in that story is a bit jarring after the more violent perspectives of Malcolm and Clay.
There are some minor continuity problems with the first novel, Bitten, but they can mostly be quietly retconned away on the grounds that the events covered in "Ascension" in particular were described in Bitten by someone who'd only heard about them secondhand. I'm going to assume these changes were a deliberate decision on Armstrong's part to discard details written before she knew this would take off as a major series, rather than carelessness. The inconsistencies are minor enough for me to live with.
I've lost perspective on this series a bit, since I'm so steeped in all the material from the previous books that it's difficult for me to judge how much appeal this would have to someone who hasn't read them. My gut feeling is that this book is primarily going to be of interest to people who've read Bitten and would like some background on its characters. I'm not sure Armstrong gives quite enough background to make it work well for people coming in cold, although the "Savage" sections just might make up the difference, since the reader can follow along with Clay as bits of Pack life and history get explained. So I recommend it for followers of the series or at least fans of the first book, and cautiously for anyone else.
Since I do heartily recommend Bitten itself for those interested in sexy werewolf romps that are several substantial cuts above standard paranormal romance, here are links for both books:
The last time I saw werewolves, I got restrained.
Posted by: Marilee J. Layman | September 25, 2009 at 06:43 PM
hie:
I myself did some hieing when I was in the Bay Area. Some of it literal, some of it more metaphorical, meaning that after some striving, I figured out what that project at the office was all about. The users are quite relieved. So am I. There is only so much hieing that one can do.
Posted by: Serge | September 26, 2009 at 07:59 PM