Bad Moon Rising by Sherrilyn Kenyon

Fang Kattalakis is not your typical wolf. He's the brother to Vane and Fury, and his loyalty is to his pack, and his brothers. But when he encounters Aimee Peltier, the daughter of Mama Peltier, and a bearswan lik her mother, he should know better than to be attracted to her. Sadly, it's not his mind he has to worry about, but his body, which is making its attraction only too clear.

And Aimee isn't exactly complaining, because she already has a heap of troubles on her plate. Not only does her family run one of the few neutral-ground areas in New Orleans, but they are constantly in danger of losing the right to hold it, if someone pisses off her mother- not unusual with her mother's terrible temper. But unlike the rest of her family, who are Katagaria (animals who can become human), she is an Arcadian (Human who can become an animal) and an Aristos, or a mage, to boot. Either one would be enough to get her mother enraged enough to kill her, but both together? And she's attracted to Fang, a wolf, which definitely won't go over well with her mother, whose feelings about keeping the bloodlines pure are all too well known.

Fang hates everyone equally, but when one of his brothers is drawn partway into hell after being attacked and left for dead, it's Fang who goes into Hell to retrieve it and set his brother free. But while he sets his brother free, he is drawn in himself, as Amy and the rest of his family try to get him back. But while only a few weeks pass for Aimee, Fang is stuck in the demon realm for what is months to him, constantly attacked by demons seeking to take advantage of him and suck energy from him so they can escape themselves.

Fang finds his escape in Thorn, a demon himself, but rather like a cop, supposed to police the realm with his guardians. But he needs Fang's help to get the demons who have escaped. Fang doesn't like the bargain, but he's out of other options. If he wants out, he doesn't have much of a choice. But can he and the rest of his family save Aimee from hers and the Demons?

I usually like Sherrilyn Kenyon's novels, but this one was a real disappointment. Why? The first 3/4 of the book is flashbacks and scenes from other books redone. Okay, I get that we were seeing Fang and Aimee's side and reactions, but it was like reading retread after retread after retread. Scenes from "Seize the Night" and other previous books are retold, but some of the stuff seemed to change and be different from the way it was in earlier books- disordered from the way it happened before.

New characters are introduced- who wants to bet that Thorn and some of his enforcers will end up with stories of their own? There's a bet that's a sure thing! I suppose I wouldn't have minded the flashbacks so much if they weren't so much of the story. Frankly, there just wasn't enough new material in the story for this to be just so much "Meh." People who have read the other volumes might end up feeling a bit cheated in terms of story. I just hope the next Kattalakis brother's story won't have to add so much backstory and scenes from other books to the mix.

While this story was certainly okay, I can't, in all fairness, say I'd recommend it to anyone. Not that I'd steer people away from it, but I would have to caution them that the story will seem very, very familiar if they have read any significant portion of Sherrilyn Kenyon's other works. This book firmly straddled the middle of the road for me.