Patrice Michelle - Scions: Insurrection

When Detective Kaitlyn McKinney responds to a call about a strange, burned body, she discovers something far more complicated--and dangerous.Landon Rourke is a werewolf, exiled from his pack and dedicated to keeping a protective watch over Kaitlyn.
A prophecy has said that his kind and vampires would one day come to a truce. But that day has yet to come.
Landon has his own past to deal with, too, involving Kaitie herself. A dark truth that has kept them apart for years. When Kaitlyn gets caught up in the battle between vampires and werewolves, the long-simmering attraction she shares with Landon ignites. And in that attraction they find the secret that will bring them together...

Comment: This is the second book in the Scions series by author Patrice Michelle. As it happened with the previous story, I've had it for a long time and in continuing my attempt to give chances to long lived TBR titles here it is another book from that pile. As soon as I finish the books I've got in the series, the better. It will be mission accomplished.

This new story is about Landon, a werewolf. He's friends with vampire Jachin from the first book and despite not being alpha he should be. But he lives in guilt and despair of old happenings.

Kaitlyn is a young woman, a dedicated cop with a dying mother. She wants to do her work and when she sees strange marks on the floor after a fire she doesn't know what to think. Landon helps her and she can't hide the fact she's had a crush on him for a while.

But Kaitlyn isn't any random woman, in fact her past comes to meet the present of a man who needs to let go...

Well, once again I can't say this was perfect. I find it more and more difficult to fully appreciate a book for what it's worth based on how my tastes run these days, compared to what they were when I got this story. 

There was a time when I would look for any paranormal I could find that met the criteria of shape shifters and romance. These days I've kind of filtered a lot and this book seems dated compared to what I look for now. It's not the elements themselves that aren't up to it now, it's just that now I need the way the story is told to work in a certain way, to have a certain structure. It's really hard to find things you can't really explain why they work on some cases and not on others.

I think the place where I'm at right now in terms of reading allows for a wide range of genres and types of stories but I always look for structure and a fascinating well developed plot. In this book's case, all the things that were supposed to make it amazing seemed too clichéd and not seductive enough.

I wish the author would have dedicated more time to develop the idea of pack, of a social structure for them. I can't help but think of successful worlds whose authors created wonders when I read paranormal worlds alike or based on the same idea. If Nalini Singh and Anne Bishop created such wonderfully detailed and rich and seductive paranormal worlds, why can't all authors? I know it's not fair, but I always, always, look for the magic to repeat itself...

Then the clichés used are repetitive and the writing, although good, wasn't done in a way to make things seem like they only could work that way. There's no special "something" to twist what we've seen so often. Nevertheless, the story flows and if there's one thing I thought was really good was how all the police issues investigated (and plot related) were solved way before the book ended so the final part, so to speak, was more about the pack and the lives of the main couple.

The main couple...apart from the usual clichés expected, the mate recognition and the destiny having done it all, the insta-attraction if not love, the "I-need-to-let-you-go-because-it's-better-this-way" thing, along with others, well putting all this aside, I think they were suitable for each other, but I never felt they actually thought about it, except the fact they are destined and attracted. Their interactions never convinced me they were a great couple on their own - if we were to remove all the things that made them be together. I think there's some lacking of a building relationship, which should be there instead of the "just because".

In the end, I had some fun with the book, but no, it didn't wow me, it didn't surprised me or made me desperate to know more about this world or those who live there.

I plan to finish the books I have because I like to know I got closure on the task of reading them after having the for so long.

This wasn't amazing but truth to be told, it was average good and entertaining enough.

Grade: 6/10