Synopsis from Amazon:
But Red is a wolf tracker. Though she doesn't come into her powers until the death of the current wolf tracker in her family, her grandmother. Her blood carries the wolfsbane gene, the only thing that helps humans build a resistance to the Lycan virus. Her family has been donating blood for ages in the hopes of keeping the virus at bay.
When her grandmother becomes too sick to do her job, the werewolf community wonders why their judge has gone on hiatus. And one pack alpha decides it's time to get rid of the line of wolf trackers once and for all.
>>>>>>>>
My Review:
Well, all I can say is, that was an
unexpectedly short book!
Honestly, it felt like more of a
"prequel novella" than the actual first installment. It
starts out in the middle of everything, with the characters more or
less already falling apart, which meant that both Red and Peter had
to give their history through flashbacks... Not really a great recipe
for emotional connection!
I will say, the way the story treats
the source material is really clever: a sidearm called Woodcutter,
the fact that Red is a Wolf Tracker, famous for the fact that they
will ruthlessly hunt down and slay werewolves (shades of Grimm
there!)... the complication of a really close family friend
ending up being a werewolf, and part of a pack that wants to end the
Wolf Tracker line once and for all...
The trouble is that there were a lot of
concepts and ideas that I would have loved to see fleshed out more:
the different "storybook" characters who attend the
Wonderland Guardian Academy, like the "Oz sisters", which
are of course the three witches from The Wizard of Oz are
briefly mentioned, but that's all. There was the mysterious doctor
who seemed to know the Wolf Trackers and how to spot a werewolf...
but not much was said about him, either. For a while I almost
wondered if he was even in league with the werewolves, when the story
itself wasn't very forthcoming!
A quick check of the other novels in
this series proved that they're all full-length novels, instead of
short like this one, which made me a little bit miffed... But on the
whole, it's a great story, and a good "appetizer" to get me
in the mood for the rest of the series!
I like the world she's built, the way
she's set things up so that the different fairy tales can coincide
and cross in new and inventive ways in this contemporary setting (not
unlike a another fairytale-based show, Once Upon A Time), and
most of all, I am down for these new characters with their own unique
personalities and mannerisms! Creeden does awesome fantasy, and I am
definitely looking forward to more of the Wonderland Guardian
Academy!
On the whole, "Red The Wolf
Tracker" earns a fairly decent *****4.5 STAR***** rating, and an
Upstream Writer Certified Heartily Recommended. It wasn't the
absolute best re-telling (for
the reasons I listed above) it could have been, but it wasn't
mediocre at all, and
it certainly did the job of whetting my appetite for more! I'm just
happy to have a new re-telling to explore and enjoy, from the trusted
and supremely capable pen of Pauline Creeden!
Further Reading: (Also By The Author/Fairy Tale Re-Telling/Urban Fantasy/Female Lead)
The Fair Folk Chronicles--Jeffrey Cook and Katherine Perkins
-Foul is Fair
-Street Fair
-A Fair Fight
-All's Fair
-Foul is Fair
-Street Fair
-A Fair Fight
-All's Fair
Starstruck Saga--S. E. Anderson
The Children of Dreki--N. R. Tupper
-TYR
-TYR
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