I just finished a re-listen of this. Aspects of it irk me - it bothers me when Charles confidently dismisses Anna's statement about not liking sex because he knows she'll enjoy sex with him, for example - and yet I like Anna and Charles' relationship in the first few entries in this series more than Mercy's various relationship options in the Mercy Thompson books.

Maybe at some point I'll actually write a full review for this. According to my records, I haven't yet, although I've listened to this (and previously read it) several times.

For some reason the Charles and Anna pairing worked better and more immediately for me than the Mercy and Adam pairing. Although I've only read the this story and the first couple Alpha & Omega books, I've actually reread them, whereas I haven't felt an urge to do that with any of the Mercy Thompson books.

I still really like this story. My only issue with it is the part where Anna tells Charles she doesn't like sex and he views it as a challenge. I understood what Briggs was aiming for, but it still made me uncomfortable.

"On The Prowl" is an urban fantasy short story collection in which each of the four authors has a story.

I bought it (despite the tacky cover art that makes me glad I'm reading the ebook version) because Debbie's Spurts told me that I should read the Patrica Briggs' prequel to her Alpha and Omega series before starting the series.

The stories by the other three authors were by way of a bonus as they are all new to me.

Alpha and Omega by Patricia Briggs

On her website, Patricia Briggs describes the Alpha and Omega series as:

"...set in the same world as the Mercy Thompson Series, but on a slightly earlier time line. It begins with a novella titled Alpha and Omega published in the On the Prowl anthology. The decision to continue the story was made after the anthology had already been published, which has caused some confusion, since "book 1" is a actually a continuation of the short story."

She characterises the series as placing:

"... more emphasis on the romantic attraction between the hero and heroine. On a romance-readers scale, this series is sweet rather than steamy."

While it was interesting to see more of the world the Mercy Thompson novels are set in, I was a little disappointed in this novella. The story works as a standalone. The action is well-done. I just found myself thinking: "Patricia Briggs can do much better than this."

My main problem was the lack of emotional depth. It seemed to me that the "focus on romantic attraction" translated into making other emotions take a backseat.

The main female character, Anne has been attacked, forcibly turned into a werewolf and passed around the Pack by her Alpha as a rape-toy so often that she's attempted suicide.

The main male character is a laconic, emotionally withdrawn enforcer whose job is to kill those who break his father's rules.

Perhaps I'm not widely enough read on the topic but none of this sounds romantic to me.

The idea that these two would be able to set aside trauma and learned low self-esteem on Anne's side and a long lifetime of keeping emotionally distant in order to be able to kill on command on Charles' part and find a mating bond instantly was hard to take.

The attraction was well described but it seemed to be at the price of downplaying the baggage the pair have.

I think one of the strengths of the Mercy Thompson series is that when a rape occurs there, it is not downplayed and its effects are felt for a number of books.

This story felt like "Mercy-Lite". Still, perhaps Patricia Briggs needs the novel format to do what she does. I'll read the rest of the story in the first Alpha and Omega novel and find out.

"Inhuman" by Eileen Wilks

This was my first Eileen Wilks story so everything had the advantage of being new.  The world building was original and stimulating. There was a relatively complicated plot for a short story. It managed to surprise me more than once, making me revisit the meaning of the title repeatedly.

The romance part was a little plodding. The people felt half-formed and inappropriately inexperienced or inarticulate. On the cusp between cute and you've-got-to-be-kidding.

The heroine's name confused me at first as everyone I know called Kai is male. Here it's pronounced like Sigh, not Hay. It took me awhile to work out that this was Kay with innovative vowel usage. I was also unclear how I was supposed to know that Kia was Native American (other than who isn't in Urban Fantasy - being WASP is so uninteresting).

The ending was a good set up for an upcoming book but I felt it walked away from a lot of what the plot was set up to do. I'd been following a hunt for a killer and when the hunt was over the outcome left me wondering what all the look-how-awful-this-killer-is build-up was for.

Even so, I was impressed with the originality of the ideas and the pacing of the execution.

"Buying Trouble" by Karen Chance

This made me laugh and it took a turn that I really didn't see coming.

It's a fast, light read filled with fast, light violence and sex and sprinkled with slightly indignant humour.

The ending was a bit - whoops-running-out-of-space-let's-skip-to-an-epilogue for my tastes but the story was a smile and the world was original so it was worth the read.

"Mona Lisa Betwining" by Sunny

I'd wondered why there was no editorial credit for this collection. The inclusion of "Mona Lisa Betwining" suggests to me that the ommission was driven by sheer embarrassment.

It's a short story that I lacked the stamina to make it to the end of.

First, there was this set of sentences which read like a rough first-draft yet are offered as the finished product:

"He was handsome, strikingly so. Like a Greek god of old. And he was more than just a pretty face. He was my new master of arms."

A little later I dragged my mind through the following sentences and realised that this prose was too awful to live with.

"I moved toward the door but he did not step away, allow me to pass. I stopped a mere foot away and looked askance at him."

I ended up not reading all of the stories in "On the Prowl". I did back in the day, but since I wanted to read this for the "Werewolves" square for my second bingo card for Halloween Bingo 2017, I didn't feel the need to read all of the stories. From what I recall the first time, I was not that impressed with all of the stories, but ended up falling in love with the characters of Anna and Charles.

If you read the "Alpha & Omega" series, make sure you start with this one first otherwise you may be confused about Anna's background.

This story has Charles (the Marrok's son) coming to Chicago to investigate what is going on with a local wolf pack. A werewolf named Anna calls him and right away when Charles meets her, he feels a pull towards her. Charles's wolf decides that it will have Anna as his mate (in like five seconds by the way) and Charles's tells Anna how special she is among werewolves. We find out that Anna is an omega werewolf. When Charles meets with the local leaders, a few things come out about the local pack and Anna is left to decide to stay with them or follow Charles.

I really loved this book. There is some info-dump since in none of the Mercy Thompson books was anything ever spoken about omega werewolves to this point. We get to find out that Anna being an omega means she does not have to obey the alpha werewolf in her Pack. She also has an effect on other werewolves and can calm them down and push away any lingering mental sickness they may have.

I remember feeling awful for Anna when you read about how she was changed, what was done to her by members of her Pack after the change and it just left a bad taste in my mouth about werewolves in general. To this point I was more familiar with Adam and his Pack in the Mercy Thompson series.

Charles was a great hero to root for though I wanted to know more about his upbringing. We know that he is Bran's enforcer, but it seemed to me that he was a little lost until he met Anna. In later books we get to see how being Bran's enforcer affects Charles though so I was glad that Patricia Briggs brings that up in the later series.

The writing was typical Briggs though I will say that there was some repetitiveness in some places that I think show up again in the later story, "Cry Wolf." I was never so happy in my life when Briggs stopped writing about how Omega did not mean weak and she didn't have to listen to others. We got it. Please stop saying it in every story.

The flow was good though I thought the book ended on a weird note. I know when I read "Cry Wolf" after this though, that the action picks up right after the ending of this book though.

A great little story that you should read before reading the full length novels.

 Book two in Cynthia Eden's Bad Things series follows a shifter assassin for the devil himself and a human woman who hates violence who is violently turned into a vampire. Their story was entertaining and passionate. The antagonist and conflict were intriguing. Julian is a rough-around-the-edges kind of man who lives a violent life and who knew from the start that he was the wrong man for Rose, but also knowing he couldn't walk away. Rose has tried to hate him for the choice he took from her, but he is still the man she fell for when she was a naïve human. Together they must stop the Collector from acquiring his next specimen, her. Along the way, he mates with her without telling her, she drinks angel blood which she should never have done, they rescue the other victims, find out who is the one who gave a human strong enough magic to cheat death and compel people to do his bidding, and of course have a happy ever after ending for the beast assassin of the devil and vampire who doesn't like violence.  I enjoyed it a lot. Julian is the kind of male lead that is delicious and strong on every page he appears on. Rose is the perfect compliment to him, though it takes him a while to figure that out. Overall, a fun adventure and romance.