Nocturne

Series: Claire de Lune (#2)
Genre: Drama
Author: Christine Johnson
Publisher: Simon and Schuster

I had some harsh words for Claire de Lune when I first read it. After a year, however, I look on it a little more highly. Yes, the author made some bad mistakes, and her general inexperience was obvious, but at least it was creative. It wasn't just trying to be another Twilight knockoff, and it wasn't just another batch of standard-issue lycanthropes, either.  Johnson had some good ideas, and blended the werewolves with elements of a witch's coven and a predominantly-female cast to give the story a feminist bent. Nocturne is a substantial improvement from it's predecessor, with a deeper storyline and much-improved characterization and pacing. But unfortunately, it hasn't improved enough. Try as I might, I just couldn't get into it, and it leaves me with the sour, undercooked taste of wasted potential.

Kitty Goes to War

Series: Kitty Norville (#8)
Genre: Drama/Adventure
Author: Carrie Vaughn
Publisher: Tor

There comes a time when you just can't take another helping of the same old thing. I'm not at that point yet with Kitty Norville, but I'm getting there. Maybe it's my fault for going through the whole shebang in less than a year, but Kitty Goes to War went down like that meatloaf in a cliche 50's sitcom: Tasty, well-made, but, geeze, meatloaf again?

Red Moon Rising

Series: Stand-Alone
Genre: Drama
Author: Peter Moore
Publisher: Hyperion

Peter Moore is an obscure author. He doesn't have a website, at least not one that I could find, and his Goodreads page seems to conflate his work with that of several other people with the same name. This is probably why his book Red Moon Rising hasn't gotten a whole lot of press. It's a real shame, too, because this is excellent writing. It reaches above the usual love stories found in YA paranormal to give us a much deeper tale of bigotry and personal identity.

Low Red Moon

Series: Stand-Alone
Genre: Drama/Romance
Author: Ivy Devlin
Publisher: Bloomsbury Childrens

About thirty pages into Low Red Moon, I e-mailed a couple of friends giving my estimation of how the plot was going to turn out. When I got to the end, I had to sheepishly admit that I was wrong on a good number of things. So I suppose I should give the author props for being original. But- call it sour grapes if you will- the story I had assumed was coming was a whole lot better than Low Red Moon.

Lonely Werewolf Girl

Series: Kalix MacRiannalch (#1)
Genre: Comedy/Drama
Author: Martin Millar
Publisher: Soft Skull Press

Hard-luck protagonists are nothing new, but Kalix MacRiannalch is on another level. We first meet her as a homeless, degenerate junkie living on the streets of London. She's pawned her only means of protection to afford laudanum- her drug of choice. She's evading a guild of Van Helsing wannabes that want her dead on general principles, as well as the members of her former clan, who want her dead for trying to kill her father the Thane. We soon learn she's also illiterate, friendless, pining for a lost love, depressed nearly to the point of suicide, and quite possibly insane. So I was expecting a moody and depressing view of life in the streets of London, but it turns out that- some very dark bits aside- this book veers more towards comedy. By way of literary anarchism.

Claire de Lune

Series: Claire de Lune (#1)
Genre: Drama
Author: Christine Johnson
Publisher: Simon Pulse

Reviewing debut novels can be very difficult. On the one hand, there is an impulse to encourage promising talent and praise fresh perspectives. On the other hand, in all areas of life, newbies make mistakes. A lot of first books struggle with the author's inexperience and stylistic flaws, and the reviewer has a responsibility to be honest both to his reader and the author. So I must regretfully report that Claire de Lune is not a good read. In fact- although it pains me to say this- this is a book that does nearly nothing right.