Thursday, April 15, 2010

Shadow of the Moon by Rachel Hawthorne


"Hayden was born a werewolf, a Dark Guardian. But her ability to sense the feelings of fellow werewolves has made her life unbearable. She runs away, only to be tracked by charming, mysterious Daniel, a newcomer to the pack and the one Shifter immune to her powers. As she reluctantly follows him home, Hayden finds herself falling dangerously in love. . . .

But even as her feelings for Daniel deepen, Hayden begins to wonder if he is who he claims to be. Where did he come from and why has no one ever seen him transform? When they stumble upon the body of a Shifter still in wolf form, her worries grow. Someone is killing her kind. Is her handsome tracker really a hunter? And is Hayden now his prey?"-Goodreads.com

Overall: 4/5

I adored each of the first three books in this series, but when you think about it, they all seem to tell pretty similar tales. One of my main fears when I picked up this book was that, after a fourth re-telling, it would start to become painfully obvious and distrssingly annoying that there really was nothing new to add to these stories.

I needn't have worried. Hawthorne has come through once again with something new; an original perspective on an original situation. It didn't feel redundant or monotonous, despite my doubts.

You could tell that Hawthorne stepped a little out of her element for this one, though. There were some actual battle scenes, which always adds some excitement. But love and romance are Hawthorne's strengths and some of those action sequences seemed a bit rushed and/or strained.
The other thing that bugged me a little was something I had expected to be in there, but wasn't. In previous books (all three of them, I think), there had been some aluding to the possibility that keeping the werewolves a secret from the world was becoming too much of a challenge in a world full of advnaced technology and that maybe it was time to start thinking about going public with their species. By the end of the last one, it had become the primary issue on their minds and I thought that this one would have some sort of final decision on that, some key action that would signal the beginning of a movement. Or, you know, anything. But there was no mention of the issue anywhere in the fourth book. I feel like it was just left kind of hanging there, with no conclusion in sight.

Maybe they'll return to it in a future book, even though there's no mention of one as of yet.

Characters: 4/5
Plot: 4/5
Ending: 4/5
Writing: 4/5
Cover: 5/5
Happy Factor: 4/5

Other books by Rachel Hawthorne: Moonlight, Thrill Ride, Caribbean Cruise, Suite Dreams

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