Customer Reviews

Running with the Pack

5 star:		(2)
4 star:		(1)
3 star:		(3)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

I almost never give 5 stars to an anthology as there are usually some poor stories in there. These range from a trip to the underworld kind of boring and very symbolic but very well written and if you aren't a lore master might be better; to the tragedy of the last story. The Vaughn is a back story on T.J. and is better if you have read Kitty and the Midnight Hour (Kitty Norville, Book 1) but that isn't needed I recommend the book is the start of an excellent series.

But many of the authors are unfamiliar and most of the stories are great, a really good surprise. The Editor has refrained for writing for he volume and shows a lot of talent in selecting excellent stories. I look forward to hearing more from her.

I like paranormal stories with vampires, witches, and of course, werewolves. I think this anthology is a mixed bag - it contains some good, average, and bad. I have read a lot of different authors with werewolves as characters. Perhaps, that is why this book fell a bit short for me. I have read a lot of good stories about werewolves, and I had high expectations for this book. I was looking forward to reading authors I enjoy and discovering some new ones. Overall, the book was good. There are good stories by authors I enjoy like C.E. Murphy, Laura Ann Gilman, and Maria V. Snyder, but also some duds. I was especially disappointed in Carrie Vaughn's story that starts out the book because I love her Kitty books. I felt that the story TJ's viewpoint didn't cover any new area that wasn't hinted in her first book. I did come across some new to me authors whose work I enjoyed like Stephanie Burgis, Karen Everson, N.K. Jemisin, and Mike Brotherton. I liked the new ideas or new twists to old stories they brought to the book. I gave the review 4 stars instead of 3 because the good stories make up for those I could have done without reading.

This volume represents the best werewolf anthology money can buy. If you only have two minutes, hit purchase. You won't regret it.

Werewolves on motorcycles, in suburbs, locked in the basement; family curses, aquired diseases, accidental side-effects—Running with the Pack offers up 22 werewolf stories from a variety of modern urban fantasy authors. Those offerings are plentiful and brief, and werewolves are an engaging base premise, and so the collection is more consumable than most short story anthologies. However, few of the stories stand out: there's a number which are decent but forgettable, just as many which are disappointing, and only a handful I'd consider good--of which only two are must-reads. Too often the stories are written to theme, even if they weren't written for this collection; they rely on the fact of their werewolves, putting all their energy into basic world/monsterbuilding, and say little more than that: where werewolves are an analogy, it's cursory or blatant; in large part, there's nothing alive or wild in these beasts. Downum's "The Garden, The Moon, The Wall" is one exception--her story is dreamlike, liminal, and haunted. Palwick's "Gestella" is another, a brutal experiment in voice which turns werewolves into incisive social critique. "Blended," "The Direwolf," and "Inside Out" are also pretty good, and some of them are unique to this collection. But on the whole, Running with the Pack is uninspired. It can be an addictive mix, and offers an interesting (if not particularly promising) overview of modern urban fantasy authors, but that's about all. I can't recommend it.

This was an ok read, Some of the stories better than others. All of the stories were short and
tales of wolves and werewolves. Some had happy endings, some not. There wasn't a lot of character build or ends wrapped up, but they were short stories and some good, some not.
I struggled to finish the book, after hitting a few poor ones....

I devour books - sometimes one a day, at least five per week. I love a good paranormal story, and this collection has a few authors I usually love. I want a book that I can't put down, and the description of this book sounded great. To my dismay, this book made it way too easy to go to bed early. Many of the stories, although well-written, were glimpses into places I had no interest in visiting. I have to admit, I only made it halfway through the book before I decided I just didn't care about reading the rest.