Cry Wolf (Alpha and Omega, #1)

by Patricia Briggs

[jesstheaudiobookworm]

4.25★ Audiobook⎮My discovery and subsequent love of Patricia Briggs through her Mercy Thompson series, led me to Cry Wolf. Although it didn’t pack the same type of punch, Cry Wolf was a nice accompaniment to the Mercy Thompson series.

To be honest, Cry Wolf didn’t resonate with me as much as its prequel novella Alpha and Omega. At the center of Cry Wolf is a love story. There’s all sorts of action surrounding it, but it’s still about Charles and Anna at the end of the day. I would categorize the Mercy Thompson series as firmly Paranormal, but the Alpha and Omega series is definitely Paranormal Romance (PNR).

My taste tends to lean more towards Paranormal than PNR, but Patricia Briggs’ excellent writing and world building persuaded me to make an exception. Both series exist within the same universe. Sam Cornick is a prominent character in the Mercy Thompson series and his brother Charles is a main character in the Alpha and Omega series.

Charles’ mate, Anna, is an Omega wolf. Omegas are rare and have special calming powers over all wolves. They are often confused for submissive wolves. That’s about as far as my current understanding of Omega wolves goes. Briggs did a wonderful job of balancing this new information with the action and romance of the story. I was given enough information to understand the basic importance of Omegas, but not so much that I felt overwhelmed.

We got to see something in Cry Wolf that I’ve been itching for a recent Mercy Thompson books: Witches. Several species of paranormal creatures are featured in Mercy Thompson’s series, but witches are mostly left in the shadows. Cry Wolf brings them to center stage.

Even though I was super excited to have a witch villain in this story, something about it left me underwhelmed. I suspect that Cry Wolf may have introduced too much new content, without the cushion of familiarity. There was only the slimmest of connections to Mercy Thompson and the characters I’ve come to love. I appreciate that this is a new and fresh series, so I suppose I’ll have to be patient until I develop more organic feelings for the characters of Charles and Anna.

I could easily love Charles (more than Sam!), but I’m still warming to Anna. I cannot understand why she has been mistaken as a submissive wealth, since she is coming off as a submissive character. However, having read the prequel to this installment, and I also understand why she is behaving that way. I’m truly hoping that she will begin to come into her own as the series progresses. There is so much room for character growth with her.

This is a series that I’m interested in eventually continuing on with, but I’m not yet hooked. There’s certainly the potential for it though! I can imagine that PNR fans could fall even more deeply in love with this series than I did with Mercy.

Narration review: Holter Graham gave a respectable performance in Cry Wolf. He was definitely the right call to narrate this series. I get such a clear mental image of Charles Cornick whenever Graham voices him. His vocalizations of the female characters do not seem strained or out of his range and he has a great grasp on the emotions in the story. ♣︎