Considering the fact that I stayed up until four in the morning reading this novel, I think that is enough to say I liked it. The romance was a bit slow going in that there was murder, kidnapping, and betrayal to solve first. I, for one, have no problem with that. My one problem with the story was the fact that I read the teaser from book 4. The teaser began book five with Adam arriving in Texas and being brought into the room with Cara's entire wolf pack rushing to him to plead for his help in becoming their much needed alfa before their pack becomes instict or taken over. That was completely the opposite of what happened in this book. For awhile I stayed confused wondering if I was confusing this book with another series, but I guess the teaser was only an idea of the authors but nothing set in stone. Otherwise, I thought this was a great addition to the series.

Even wolves in the wild find a little privacy for mating. If you read this you will see what I mean. I found that scene gross. And not set up well enough to keep me from being tossed right out of the story. It colored my impression of the whole book and not in a good way. In front of relatives..eew. I did think the characters were well drawn in the begining and I enjoyed the scenes with the heroines family and the those where the intended couple are getting to know each other. The resolution didn't make the grade in my opinion and some things like when one adult character speaks through the mouth of a child via magic to 'let the family know they are all right', that was just horrible and violating, in my opinion. The family is portrayed as devout hispanic catholics, delivering a message that way smacks of demon possession and was a cruel and gross thing to do, out of character with what was written earlier in the book. Bummer. Try one of their others because there is some good writing in this and the world they've built is interesting it just didn't carry all the way through this work for me and I wished I'd been warned.

I've been a big fan of the Sazi series since it came out. I was pleased to see a brief cameo made by Tony and Robert from the first two books. But even a visit from the old characters did nothing to liven up the story.

Unlike the other four books, I had no desire to reread it again. No desire to reconnect to the characters, or laugh at an amusing moment. Thankfully, I checked this one out front the library. Worth at least one read, but nothing that would make me want to wait for the next book in the series.

I'm hoping CT Adams and Cathy Clamp haven't run out of ideas for their Sazi books, because I really like the world they created! But this one wasn't one of their better efforts. The main characters didn't seem like great alphas - too accommodating, too submissive, too inadequate. They're both decent enough people, but aren't very enthralling as main characters. And the evil that must be faced here is so nebulous as to be incomprehensible. There is obviously a "big bad" out there, but information about it was so sparsely defined that it would have been better to leave it out of this book entirely. It wasn't necessary at all for Adam's presence among Cara's pack. And the way Lucas, Bobby, and Tony were worked into the story was pretty contrived. The whole thing would have worked better as the secondary story arc in a different book.

This fifth book in the Sazi series is rather variable. Parts were very good and parts rather dragged or didn't feel comfortable. Although the fifth in the Sazi series, about werewolves, and containing many of the characters of previous books, it isn't necessary to have read any Sazi stories before to understand most of the events in this one. There are some less common aspects to this series, for example the frequent discussion of scents that the werewolves detect, even in human form, which help them to know whether people are lying or afraid, but there's also much that is familiar in this sort of tale, including the Alpha Male character in this book, Adam Mueller. Adam's like lots of other policemen male characters and he loses some points in this story for not telling the heroine, Cara Salinas, what's going on half the time.

Cara has become the Sheriff of Tedford County in Texas when the previous Sheriff had a stroke. However she's found it a little difficult to adjust and things aren't made any easier in that she is now the Alpha of her small pack. It can be very hard for her to reconcile her werewolf rules, to protect them from discovery, with her policewoman's need to help and to serve. When she is visited by Adam Mueller from Minneapolis and discovers that some of Adam's pack may have to move down to her territory it starts a lot of planning as to how this can be managed. There's also a side plot with a lot of giant birds apparently eating livestock and stealing young girls; this part of the plot moved in fits and starts and was always a bit weird.

The good aspects of the story were some of the locations, the story being told from the point of view of the Latina policewoman as well as through Adam's eyes, and the interesting and varied range of characters. However it never felt like it really glued together as a proper story, the romantic element seemed rather more of an afterthought at times, and the different plot threads being linked seemed too ridiculously unlikely a coincidence. I finished the book not entirely sure why the girls had been kidnapped, what was going to happen to them in the future, and who the snake man really was (presumably he will appear in a subsequent book). This story is probably one for fans of the Sazi series and not one for a newcomer as, despite its good points, it wasn't completely satisfying.

Originally published for Curled Up With A Good Book © Helen Hancox 2007