897 and counting …

• Posted in Books I've Read

Finished Bitten by Kelley Armstrong. Several people have mentioned Armstrong’s Women of the Otherworld series to me, so I picked up the first book to try.

This book is about Elena Michaels, the world’s only female werewolf. Elena isn’t happy she was bitten and turned into a wolf, and she’s broken away from the Pack and is living on her own in Toronto. But when people start dying on Pack land in New York, Elena goes home to help the rest of the wolves figure out what’s going on. Once there, she has to deal with some dangerous enemies and Clayton, her former lover and the man who bit her and turned her into a wolf.

I’d read one of Armstrong’s short stories about Elena in one of the My Big Fat Supernatural anthologies, and I had high hopes for this book. There were a lot of things I liked about it. Elena is an intriguing character who isn’t afraid to be tough and ruthless when the situation calls for it. (There’s a really great scene at the end that shows her coming into her own.) Plus, Armstrong has some good descriptions of Toronto and what it’s like to be a werewolf. Her world building was very well done.

But ultimately, the book didn’t work for me for a number of reasons, the biggest of which was Clayton, the hero. I just didn’t like him. Clayton and Elena were engaged, and he took her home to meet his family (the Pack). While there, Clayton purposefully bit Elena to make her turn into a werewolf — a very painful process that could have resulted in her death. But the kicker is Clay never told her he was a werewolf. Elena never asked to be bitten, but Clay took it upon himself to decide what was best for her.

I’m not fond of alpha men (they usually just don’t work for me), and Clay is definitely an alpha who views Elena as his and his alone. There’s another scene where he takes Elena out into the woods and ties her to a tree. Elena doesn’t want to sleep with him at this point, but Clay presses the issue and she eventually gives in. Ugh. Forced seduction scenes like this one are something else I just don’t enjoy. No means no.

Overall, I thought Clay was selfish and manipulative. If I’d been Elena, I think I would have used my werewolf powers to rip his throat out. Not forgiven him for everything he put her through. I also wasn’t too fond of Jeremy, the leader of the Pack. I felt he could have done more to keep Elena from being bitten in the first place.

And then there was the Pack itself. It seems whenever the wolves (they’re all male) get a human woman pregnant and she has a boy, they take the child away from the mother with no explanation. Boys carry the werwolf gene and will eventually become wolves themselves. However, girls are ignored because they don’t carry the gene and will not become wolves.

I realize the wolves are taking the kids away so they can train them and keep their secret safe from the rest of the world. But the basic thought of the male wolves is that human women are good enough to sleep with and impregnate, but not good enough to raise a male werewolf. And the girls that the wolves father, don’t they care about them at all? It doesn’t seem like they do.  

So while there were things I liked about Bitten, I just couldn’t get over Clay’s character, how Elena goes back to him, and the overall actions of the Pack. Thumbs down.

On a side note, one of the women in my critique group mentioned that she likes Armstrong’s Otherworld books about a witch named Paige better than the werewolf books. I might give one of those a try.

Up next: Lover Enshrined by J.R. Ward.

Books in my TBR pile: About 13.

11 Responses to “897 and counting …”

  1. Marg says:

    I definitely prefer the third and subsequent books in this series to the first one. Eventually Clay grew on me as well, but it took a long time!

  2. Jennifer Estep says:

    Like I said in the review, one of my friends likes the witch books better than the werewolf ones. Do you have to read all the Otherworld books in order? Because I was thinking about jumping ahead and reading one of the Paige books.

  3. Jody W. says:

    Oooh, yeah, those sound like things that would hit my no-thanks-o-meter, too. I realize sometimes authors like to create and explore societies or cultures that are different from ours, but honestly, seems like the majority of the societies you see “created” are your basic patriarchal, women-are-less-than models, and rarely do the characters in the book subvert this in any way that interests me. It’s either outright “sassy” or “feisty” rebellion that doesn’t convince me or status quo. One book I read that subverted this typical model in a more interesting way was Hambly’s “The Sisters of the Raven” (the beginning of a series, of course).

    I did read one of the Paige books and enjoy it.

  4. celeber says:

    There is a Men of the Otherworld coming out that will feature Clays story. Kelley actually had this up on her site, but now that it will be published she had to take it down.
    I liked Clay much better after reading his story.

  5. Jennifer Estep says:

    Yeah, I don’t particularly like reading about socities (made up or otherwise) where women are treated as second-class citizens either. It already happens too much in real life.

    Basically, all the male wolves in Bitten treated Elena like she was their kid sister. Except for Clay, of course. I just didn’t get the sense she was equal to everyone else. And the thing about the wolves ignoring their female children really bugged me.

    I’ve never heard of Hambly’s book. Is it worth reading?

    I think I’ll try a Paige book next time …

  6. Jennifer Estep says:

    A Clay story? Hmm. I actually might try that one if only to see what makes him tick. There’s a little bit of his backstory in Bitten, but it still didn’t justify his treatment of Elena to me.

  7. Chasity says:

    You kinda need to read Stolen before you get into Page’s story in Dime Store Magic. Some of the events that happen in Stolen make Page who she is. I read them in order, so I have no idea what the book would be like without reading them in order. But what I remember about them, I’d suggest reading Stolen first.

    To me Clay gets a bit better in Stolen. But he didn’t really bother me in Bitten, so I may be a bit biased there.

    You can always try to read Dime Store Magic, see how it goes. If you’re completely lost, then read Stolen first. I really like both of Page’s books.

    Personally I stopped reading them after Page’s story. I couldn’t get into Haunted and never looked into any of the others. But that’s just me.

  8. Jennifer Estep says:

    Chasity — Yeah, I looked on Amazon at the book descriptions and read the story line for Stolen. I always like to read a series in order, but I was hoping I could skip Stolen because of Clay.

    But it will be awhile before I get to any of these. Still need to whittle down the TBR pile some more. I’m trying to finish reading all the books I got last year before I start on any of the ones I recently bought. It’s an addiction. Sigh. :rolleyes:

  9. Chasity says:

    It is an addiction. I need to whittle down that stack of 30 library books I have right now. Or at least decide to return some of them, but I just can’t decide on any. /shrug. Oh well.

  10. Jennifer Estep says:

    One time, I had so many books checked out from the library they wouldn’t let me have anymore until I returned some. I didn’t realize I had so many at thome. That was a little embarassing … :redface:

  11. Chasity says:

    The librarian actually commented the other day that I need to contact the world records people because I obviously read very fast. She was astounded by the fact that I checked out 10 books and returned them all within 5 days or so. And yes, I read them all.

    I think right now I have about 25 books here, and another 20 or so on hold.

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