Broken by Kelley Armstrong

Broken (Otherworld, #6)

by Kelley Armstrong

In this thrilling new novel from the author of Industrial Magic, a pregnant werewolf may have unwittingly unleashed Jack the Ripper on twenty-first-century—and become his next target.

Ever since she discovered she’s pregnant, Elena Michaels has been on edge. After all, she’s never heard of another living female werewolf, let alone one who’s given birth. But thankfully, her expertise is needed to retrieve a stolen letter allegedly written by Jack the Ripper. As a distraction, the job seems simple enough—only the letter contains a portal to Victorian London’s underworld, which Elena inadvertently triggers—unleashing a vicious killer and a pair of zombie thugs.

Now Elena must find a way to seal the portal before the unwelcome visitors get what they’re looking for—which, for some unknown reason, is Elena.

Reviewed by celinenyx on

4 of 5 stars

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Part six in the extremely diverse Women of the Otherworld series, Broken is sad to say, not the best one.

Elena, only known female werewolf, is pregnant of werewolf boyfriend Clay. This makes her more vulnerable, having to rely on her Pack to protect her. When they are sent to Toronto on Pack business, they get tangled up in supernatural troubles, including rampaging Victorian serial killers, a bunch of long-extinct diseases and a multi-dimensional portal spitting out zombies. The Pack can use every supernatural help they can get.

After all this focussing on the witchcrafting part of the Women of the Otherworld family (Dime Store Magic, Industial Magic, Haunted) I was glad to be back to the reason I love this series. The werewolves! As far as the narrators go, I still enjoy Elena the most. She is so utterly kick-ass that I just love being in her head. And I guess that's why I didn't like Broken as much as say, Bitten; Elena can't kick butts with a baby on board. I had to say it, but Awesome Elena has become Elena the Clumsy Pregnant Lady. And I don't really like her. All of a sudden Clay is this cutesy protective guy. I miss my socially retarded Clay, he was much more fun.

Apart from my grumbling on the character-changes, the plot was of the calibre we are used to by Ms Armstrong. It has intrigue, betrayal, friendships, plot-twists you don't see coming. Even though there was a lot of meaningless running around, doing research and calling people, I still enjoyed this part a lot. It was good to see a decent plot again, after a little bit of a meh one in Haunted.

A minor concern I'm starting to have is that there are too many characters in this series. Every book, we meet new ones, and it's becoming really hard to keep track of them all. At some parts of the story, I was rather confused to who they were calling to now. Having had a few months break between books, I could use a memory-refresher.

Broken is very nice read and a great addition to the urban-fantasy genre. I hope kick-ass Elena is still down there somewhere. I would love to see her back.

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  • Started reading
  • 31 July, 2011: Finished reading
  • 31 July, 2011: Reviewed