Silver Borne (Book Review)

Silver Borne

Patricia Briggs

Copyright 2010

This is the fifth installment in Patricia Brigg's Mercy Thompson Series.  I love the characters Briggs has created in these books.  I was little girl giddy to dive into this book.  I started it the day I got it not caring that I hadn't finished the book I was currently reading.  I inhaled this book over the weekend and although I enjoyed it immensely I think the series may be straying a little from its original intent. 

Mercy is a were coyote that was raised by a pack of werewolves. She lives in a small town in Washington where she owns a auto repair shop specializing in VW's.  She also lives next door to Adam, the local werewolf pack alpha.  Through the books she has developed a romantic relationship with him and in this book the author emphasizes the mate bond that the two have and how they relate to each other because of it.

In this story Mercy ends up in danger because of a book she borrowed from someone in the third book in the series, Iron Kissed.  The 'book' is a focus of power that an evil doing fae really wants to get their hands on.  More drama is added when there is dissension among pack and weaknesses are taken advantage of in an effort the challenge the alpha for his position.  Her ex-boyfriend/best friend/roommate also has a crisis and is in danger of losing himself to his inner wolf, which would mean that he would die. 

Missing in this installment of the series is Stefan.  Mercy's Scooby van driving vampire friend.  It has been hinted at previously that Stefan is in love with Mercy and I'd be interested to see if the author tries to take that anywhere.  I think that it may be hard to do considering the time spent discussing Mercy's pack status and mate bond in this book.

In the first couple of books we learn that Mercy is unaware of her full power as a were coyote since she knows nothing about them having grown up in a werewolf pack.  Her father, the source of her 'power' died before she was born.  Historically they hunted vampires and Mercy seems to have some immunities to their powers.  Non of Mercy's 'unknown powers' were hinted at in this book and I'm a little bummed by that.  

Yes, I know I'm nitpicky and I cannot just enjoy something without finding the faults.  I think that by the time you get 5 books into a series you have your own expectations and wants for the characters.  I always enjoy being pleasantly surprised, unfortunately this book didn't offer any 'YaY' surprises for me.  I was 'meh' about the love re-connection encountered by Sam.  It seemed too easy and a little 'gooey and romantic'.  Brigg's lack of emphasizing the love was one of the draws to this series.  I also question this books characterizations of Warren, the homosexual werewolf, and his boyfriend Kyle.  I honestly don't remember Warren being sooo country and Kyle being so flamboyant.  

Oh well.  For all my mewing I really did enjoy this book.  As I said in the beginning I did inhale it.  I loved getting to hang with all my friends mentioned above, sans Stefan, and get to experience another adventure with them.  If I had started in on a different day it would have been a one sitting book.  I'm sad that this book done and I  look forward to the next installment with the same hand clappy giddiness I awaited this one with.