Twins Pawly and Tommy want to finish high school and just do what typical teenagers do. But they know their lives will forever be different since the family has the ability to morph into werecats (of the lynx type) but what they don’t know is how the Affliction then breaks the body down with each morph. The twins are under the impression they won’t be able to morph, but one Halloween night Pawly jumps to Tommy’s defence, and once the red vision overwhelms her, there is no holding her back. After tasting human blood in her first morph, things can only get worse.
The family have entered into some shady
deals in the past with mafia, gangs, and, most recently, a drug cartel while
trying to figure out the morphing curse, stopping the Affliction from breaking
down bodies, and just staying alive. But now the stakes are raised. With the
twins’ mom, Alex, needing a breakthrough to stop her body from rapidly breaking
down, and their father, Barry, swearing he will kill to keep them safe, their Uncle
Ritzi needs to use all his scientific knowledge to find a cure ASAP. But of
course, when an outside clan member offers assistance, hard decisions must be
made. Do something for the greater good? Or keep things as close to your immediate
family as possible? Sometimes all the alternatives are wrong...
Well, this was action-packed from start to
finish, with loads of tangents to follow. Sometimes, I found that there was too
much action, too much going on, and just as you were trying to figure out the
whys and whens, a mother or an uncle would come roaring in to save the day or move
things in a different direction.
The story seems to come from Pawly and Ritzi’s
POV and both of these bring a very different feel. Pawly’s is young and new and
innocent and learning how the world is so much more than she thinks. Ritzi’s is
very scientific and calculating and trying to figure out where things went wrong
and how he can fix the family he loves.
It was sometimes difficult to keep up with
characters and their connections to the various “gangs” as well as countries
(where from and where in currently) at times, as a lot of info is introduced
and if you were to stop reading for a few days, you might have to begin again. I
also found it difficult that sometimes foreign words were not translated so I didn’t
catch the nuance that the meaning would have had on the sentence. Some characters
played minor roles so you didn’t get too involved with them, and some
characters were only touched on but left with a story open that obviously leads
into later in the series.
It's interesting that the modern werecats
don’t necessarily know all their history and that they are living by trial and
error – probably the same as those that came before them. It seemed a blend of
the old and the new – the traditions of the turn and what happens to those who
taste human blood during it versus those who don’t. Yet they all lead down the
same path. If the DNA problem is not sorted, then their bodies will decay.
Ritzi’s exceptional turn was a little confusing but that was probably because I
was trying to keep track of loads of characters and the meandering of the
story. When it comes to a story where a lot of info is to be remembered it can
be difficult for the reader the first time around as the author will have had
this in their head for years and had all the intricacies mapped out but not
necessarily allowed the reader space to breathe to absorb it.
I liked that werecats branched out into
different species and how different types of cats were affected. I have a
feeling Lim and a young one will have a big part to play in the next book. One
thing about this story that made me think was how we accept supernatural areas
of fiction without thinking of the processes. Werewolves have to find clothes
again after turning. Vampires... well, we won’t go there. And werecats need to
shed. Not just a bit, but all of it after turning. The colander in the shower
not to clog the drain had me thinking. It opens a minefield of questions – like
what happens to whiskers? If they can growl, do their larynxes change? Where do
their claws retract to? So many logistics!
But back to the story. The writing was very
fast-paced and sometimes I would have liked more time taken to explain and
absorb the story as it felt frenetic very often. With a lot of things from the
past brought in as a one-liner to explain something or a past incident alluded
to. These led to questions that multiplied and it was sometimes difficult to
slot everything in place. The villain was a villain and then an ally and then a
villain and a hero was a hero then a villain then a hero and then it got confusing.
In the end I wasn’t even sure who I was rooting for as I wasn’t sure if the
person I was backing had an endgame. However, I appreciated the editing and the
minimal number of errors. It made the reading a lot easier.
The depth of writing can be seen in places
like the boat scene with the rescue and the waves. The writing was intense and
the descriptions so realistic that the threats involved and the feeling of
death looming were palpable.
The story covers more than just incidents. It
covers the history of clans and what happens when clans betray each other as well
as the punishment meted out from clans and human legalities alike. It gives a glimpse
of what their futures hold and how they can take past mistakes and turn them
into positives.
A fast ride with a story that has openings
to lead into the second that lovers of all things supernatural and urban fantasy
will enjoy. A decent four quills here (make them claw marks!).
Many thanks to the author for the
opportunity to review the story.
