Burn Bright, by Patricia Briggs

Burn Bright is the fifth entry in Patricia Briggs' Alpha and Omega series, a spin-off from her popular Mercy Thompson books. The series centers around Charles and Anna, a mated werewolf pair. Anna is an Omega wolf, blessed (or cursed) with the ability to calm other werewolves. Charles, the son of the world's most famous werewolf, has spent countless years as his father's in-house assassin, quietly eliminating the most dangerous wolves before they become a major problem.

In this installment, Charles and Anna get a distress call from a “wilding”—one of the handful of wolves too damaged to live with a pack. They manage to rescue the wilding from a group of would-be kidnappers, but only temporarily. The attack turns out to be part of a larger plot, and Charles, Anna, and the rest of their pack are suddenly neck-deep in a crisis that has been brewing for a very long time.

Burn Bright is basically a standalone, which makes it a good fit for casual fans who might not remember every detail of Briggs' mythology. On the downside, it means that the story's pacing and characterization feel unbalanced—the first 100-odd pages read like an extended prologue, and too many intriguing characters get short shrift. But the biggest problem with this novel is its price tag: it's just not worth $27. If publishers are going to charge that kind of cash for a series installment, they need to be longer and/or more impressive than this. There's nothing really wrong with Burn Bright, but look for it on sale or in paperback, because there's only $20 worth of material there, tops.

Review based on publisher-provided copy.