Bone Crossed by Patricia Briggs

Mercedes or Mercy, Thompson is a car Mechanic, but that's not all she is. She's also a skin-changer, a kind of Native American werecreature. But unlike Werewolves, Skin-changers aren't tied to the moon, and don't *need* to change at the full moon. They also find shifting pleasureable rather than painful, as most werecreatures do. Mercy's form, as befits her heritage, is a coyote.

But because she's not tied to the moon, Mercy found herself to be wanted by quite a number of Werewolf men who wanted her to bear their children. Female werewolves suffer spontaneous abortions when they change at the full moon- their children are unable to change, and the body flushes them out. But Mercy was holding out for love, and eventually found it with the local Alpha, Adam Hauptman, who lived next door to her.

Adam and his were-pack aren't the only supernatural creatures that Mercy has contact with. Her former boss and mentor, Zee, is a fae whose full name is Siebold Adelbertsmiter, is a Mettalzauber, what we today would call a Gremlin. Unlike most fae, he's not as affected by iron, which allowed him to start the business that Mercy eventually took over and bought from him.

She's also friends with Stefan, a vampire who drives a VW bus decorated to look like the Mystery Machine. He's the second in command to Marsilia, the vampire in charge of the city's vampires, known as a seethe. And Mercy is still recovering after being raped by a human called Tim, who had come into possession of a Fae goblet that, when drunk from, puts you into a condition of servitude to the one holding it. So in addition to being raped physically, she was also raped mentally and emotionally. Adam made her drink from it again to free her of some of the damage to her, but she's still not quite right.

Now, she's still skittish when people get too close to her, but paradoxically, she finds the scent of Adam, who she loves, to be relaxing. But when Stephan appears in her house, flayed, bleeding and burnt, she and Adam try to discover what happened to him. Stephan refuses to drink her blood, even when she offers, so Adam offers his, and some of that of his werewolves. And Mercy's mother shows up beforehand, having discovered what happened to Mercy on the news, as her attack was filmed on security cameras at her place of business.

Her mother is angry that she had to find out what happened to Mercy that way, and when Stephan shows up, she wants to kill him, too, but Mercy and Adam convince her that Stephan is a friend. Soon after, Mercy recieves another visitor, an old friend from her college days, Amber, who shows up to tell Mercy that she also found out about what happened to Mercy in the press and asks her to come to Spokane to look into a ghost infesting the house of her and her husband. Mercy doesn't let her in the house, but since Stephan tells her that Marsillia knows that Mercy was responsible for killing another one of Marsillia's seethe, and that she should run, she debates going to Spokane just to get away from Marsillia.

From Stephan, she learns that he is also being punished by Marsillia. His flock, the humans he feeds from and cares for, were all killed by Marsillia, one by one, before she inflicted the punishment on him for which he came to Mercy. He thinks that Marsillia hoped that Stephan would kill Mercy for her blood, thus wiping out Mercy, and the Werewolves would kill Stephan for her.

In the meantime, two crossed bones are placed on Mercy's garage, marking her as a traitor to the local supernatural community, and her garage is vandalized with grafitti, calling her a "whor" (no typo), among other things. Mercy is somewhat amused by the misspellings, but since Tim's sister was one of the people responsible, she is more convinced that she should go to Spokane.

The fae world is also rocked during this time by an incident in a local bar where some kind of spell is affixed to the overhead beams of the bar, causing an incident between the Fae and the Weres. Mercy saves the day by removing the thing and getting it away from the bar. One of the pack is killed, but a fae there manages to revive her.

At Amber's house, she discovers that Amber married a local businessman and has a son, Chad, who is eight years old and deaf and mute. Stephan told her before she left that there is only one vampire in Spokane, and that he defends the entire city by himself. Apparently, he's so powerful that no one is willing to cross him, and his nickname among the vampire community is "The Monster", which makes Mercy very wary of meeting him. But on the first day that Mercy gets there, she finds that Mercy's husband is hosting the vampire (who is also a businessman) at his house for dinner. Mercy meets him and is scared of him, but he's nothing but friendly to her.

Mercy talks with Chad, Amber's son (well, so to speak) and discovers that the house is indeed haunted. The ghost is strange and smells of blood, a smell also shared by Amber, which worries Mercy. Worse yet, she wakes up with a vampire bite, and after discovering that the Ghost is inimical to the family, convinces them to flee the house and get it exorcised. Soon after, she finds another vampire bite on her neck, and she can't remember getting either of them. Stephan appears to drive her home, and she lets him bite her and takes some of his blood to block the effect of the other vampire's bites.

She can tell that the master of Spokane, Blackwood, isn't pleased by what happens, but he's certainly not going to leave his city to chase her. Marsillia, meanwhile, is in negotiations with Adam and his pack, and also with Samuel, Mercy's friend and former boyfriend. But when she commands Mercy to appear, it's not for negotiations, but a trial against traitors in her Seethe. Mercy must testify, and even though Marsillia wants to kill her, she leaves Mercy alive afterwards.

Then, Amber's husband shows up at Mercy's door right after the trial and tasers her, telling her he must do it, Blackwood has his son and wife hostage. He throws Mercy in his trunk, and takes her to Spokane, where Blackwood takes her blood again, and imprisons her in the basement of his home. Amber is dead, but her spirit is somehow tied to her body, and she smells of blood. Mercy discovers that Blackwood's power is to take on the characteristics of anything he feeds off of. And he's become immune to sunlight by feeding off a fae called an Oakman, who feeds on sunlight.

But with Mercy's blood, he'll also be able to command ghosts. And there are definitely ghosts around, including that of the vampire who made Blackwood, whom he slew, and a young man who was the ghost haunting Amber's house, who resents Chad and all the wonderful toys and books he had. Can Mercy free Amber's ghost, destroy Blackwood and somehow come out of this whole business alive? She can't bring herself to be responsible for the deaths of any more people, but she may have no choice in this case. But how can she take on the Monster, when he is so powerful?

This is the first Mercy Thompson book to be published in hardcover, and the reason why was the stunning popularity of the first three books in the series. Patricia Briggs is a first-class writer, and one of the things that makes her works so strong is that for her characters, actions have consequences. To use an example- Mercy was raped at the end of the last book. Though the magic of the fae goblet allowed her to put away dealing with a lot of it, this is not something that Mercy can duck entirely.

In this book, she has to deal with feeling like she's going to bolt when men get too close to her, and an ongoing series of panic attacks that in some cases literally leave her unconscious- one so badly that Adam ties her to the pack to bring her around. That also has consquences, but... later on, Adam and Mercy manage to make love again, and she thinks this should be a cure for all her problems. It isn't, and even Adam tells her she's being unrealistic about it. She's going to suffer from this problem for quite some time, still.

That's realistic, and one of the reasons why the characters don't seem like mere characters, but real people, even with all the supernatural stuff that goes on. I also like how the supernatural characters are more than stereotypical examples of their type. The Fae aren't effete wispy things, but a collection of peoples more different than alike. And the Werewolves are also different from normal portrayals from them. They aren't one big happy family- some of them hate and dislike Mercy for what she is. They even have problems accepting some of their own who are different, like the gay werewolf, Warren.

I give this series not only a high recommendation, but I'll go further. This is a series you *must* read. It's so good that it can change your definition of what a fantasy is (or paranormal romance), and get you to see why so many people enjoy fantasy. It manages to excel in every area- characterization, plot, romance, fantasy, world-building. Authors wet-dream about being this good. Read it. You won't be disappointed.