On the Prowl by Patricia Briggs, Karen Chance, Eileen Wilks, SunnyOn the Prowl is an anthol­ogy that was released way back in August of 2007, pub­lished by Berkley and fea­tures new and orig­i­nal sto­ries by Patri­cia Briggs, Karen Chance, Eileen Wilks and Sunny. I may make some read­ers incred­u­lous by shar­ing my opin­ion on one of the sto­ries and dis­miss­ing the rest. Patri­cia Briggs has a new series com­ing out fea­tur­ing Anna and Charles, titled Cry Wolf, due out soon (July 29), that I can­not wait to read. So, it would behoove me to read this book so that I can get past the intro­duc­tions, so to speak.

Alpha and Omega by Patri­cia Briggs. First, I am not a fan of antholo­gies. I know, typ­i­cal response from most read­ers. I am so uno­rig­i­nal, for­give me. Any­way, Patri­cia Briggs is a solid writer so I was not sur­prised to find that her story was well writ­ten and that she has again, given us another set of inter­est­ing char­ac­ters set in the Mercy Thomp­son uni­verse where were­wolves are one of two super­nat­ural crea­tures known pub­licly to humankind, while more oth­er­worldly crea­tures remain hidden.

The novella is told in third per­son with a per­spec­tive seen from both Anna and Charles (and I really appre­ci­ated the hero’s POV). Anna is a wait­ress work­ing at an Ital­ian restau­rant in Chicago. Her life for the past three years has been some­what of a chal­lenge for her. She was Changed with­out con­sent 3 years ago and is apart of a were­wolf pack that is hav­ing some prob­lems. Anna is pretty much left in the dark when it comes to pack busi­ness. The rules, cus­toms and rit­u­als of this cul­ture has not be explained to her, that is until Charles Cor­nick comes fly­ing in from Mon­tana to put some things in order.

Charles Cor­nick is an exe­cu­tioner, ranked sec­ond next to the Mar­rok. It is his job to take care of pack busi­ness big or small. His father Bran, who is the Mar­rok, is in charge of all the were­wolves in North Amer­ica. Trou­bled wolves who do not learn con­trol or who find them­selves unsta­ble are han­dled dis­creetly by Charles. He does not mince words when it comes to doing his job. He has few friends and han­dles exe­cu­tions as well as busi­ness inter­ests for the Mar­rok. Charles is a dom­i­nant, more so than most other dom­i­nant wolves. He is described as being very tall, with long hair and hav­ing Native Amer­i­can good looks. I am in love already.

There’s been a spike in mur­ders and miss­ing per­sons that has been get­ting some media atten­tion of late. Charles is asked to inves­ti­gate the local Alpha, Leo, and his pack and deter­mine the prob­lem. When Anna and Charles first meet, his attrac­tion to her is explo­sive from the start. His brother wolf has already accepted Anna as his mate but Anna’s sub­servient atti­tude and low rank­ing in the pack has dam­aged much of her self-confidence. No wor­ries though because I think she’ll recover. Towards the end of the story she gains some of her spunk back. Plus, Charles informs her that she is an Omega, a were­wolf with the abil­ity to calm and soothe those around her. It’s rare to find such a crea­ture but with Anna’s Change we learn that her addi­tion to the local Alpha pack was premeditated.

The story while com­plete ended abruptly, strict word count and all that. I under­stand. Also, did I miss Anna’s last name? I didn’t see where it was men­tioned in the story but again, such details can be rec­ti­fied in the full length novel. Anna and Charles’s rela­tion­ship promises to be pretty hot. Like Mercy, the sto­ries seem to focus on the kick ass hero­ine, only Anna has to get out of her shell. She promises to be some­one to reckon with once she gains her foot­ing. Any­way, this short story was great and it only ampli­fies my excite­ment for the first book in the Anna and Charles series. My grade, A and that is with­stand­ing any flaws or loop­holes that may have occurred in the story that I may have come across and dis­missed or com­pletely didn’t see.

As for the other three sto­ries — tried Wilks but was bored. Karen Chance, I didn’t catch onto her with her first book so I didn’t even bother and Sunny — just wasn’t inter­ested. Did I men­tion that I am not a fan of anthologies?

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