I am more than a little behind with my reading right now, mainly due to my energies going into writing Daughter Of Blood (WALL 3)—so much so that it was way back on 9 March that I did my “Just Arrived” post for this book.

What I wrote then though, was: “Given some time out and a sunny corner, I’ll give you three guesses what I might be doing this weekend…”

Well, it wasn’t that particular weekend, but when I did finally sit down to read, I did power my way through Frost Burned, having a thoroughly good time. This, of course, was as I’d hoped when I also wrote that:

“I have loved Patricia Briggs‘ Mercy Thompson urban fantasy series—about an automative mechanic who is also a coyote shapeshifter—since I first read Moon Called in 2011.”

So here’s what made Frost Burned a good read for me:

As a fan of mechanic and coyote shapeshifter, Mercy Thompson, I got to spend time not just with Mercy but with many favourite characters from earlier books, including Adam and the local werewolf pack, Stefan (a vampire), Zee (a fey smith) and his son, Tad, plus quite a few others. So a big part of the book is the revisiting of relationships between established characters, which I enjoy—particularly in this case because the relationships don’t feel static or ‘cardboard cut-out.’

Don’t get me wrong though, there’s also action, plenty of it, as well as a plot that twists and turns—so that the mystery you think Mercy and her friends have to solve at the beginning of the story has assumed quite a different shape by the end.

In many ways, Frost Burned charts the same territory as Charlaine Harris’s Sookie Stackhouse series, with the juxtaposition of the human and paranormal worlds, the politics and power plays in each, and the added complication of supernatural beings such as vampires, werewolves and fey revealing themselves to the larger human populace. The thing that makes the Mercy Thompson series distinct and enjoyable in its own right is not just that Mercy is such an appealing character, but the depth of the characters around her—both the more minor players as well as the central protagonists.

The plots also have depth—although in this case I could not quite dispel a niggling feeling that the plot set up was possibly overly complex, especially in terms of the scenario at the beginning. But here’s the thing: I didn’t think that until after I had finished the book and was “reflecting.” While I was reading I was caught up in and swept along by the story, and very much did not want to put it down until I reached the end.

So in that sense, although I may “take the back off the clock” and niggle and re-examine in retrospect, while reading I was certainly not aware of the time, let alone the mechanisms that made the ‘clock’ tick.

I feel confident, therefore, that fellow fans of Patricia Briggs’ writing and the Mercy Thompson series will enjoy Frost Burned. If you haven’t tried Patricia Briggs yet but like True Blood/the Sookie Stackhouse novels, Buffy, or paranormal urban fantasy generally, then I recommend Mercy Thompson. (Do start at the beginning though, with Moon Called—you’ll enjoy the series so much more.)