Monday, December 5, 2016

The Werewolf and His Boy by Warren Rochelle



Originally, I was going to post this review as a “sometimes I review something other than religious fiction”, but then I noticed all the pagan elements.  Sorry, pagans, it’s still a religion and you don’t get to be immune to criticism.  It’s still pretty light on the religious themes, so I’ll make it one review all the same instead of doing my usual review of one chapter at a time.

The title.  I could probably go on rants about this title and the photoshop disaster that is the cover but I will restrain myself.  But, really?  You couldn’t come up with any better title than that?  It sounds creepy.  It sounds like a story of a werewolf gone full shota.  Or, and this is stretching it, maybe it’s the story of a werewolf struggling to provide for his son.  That… actually doesn’t sound like a bad book.  Definitely has some possibility.  Illustrate it and it could make a decent children’s book.  Or, make it gritty and it could be a so-so graphic novel.

The blurb is hilariously bad and contains a warning. A fucking warning. Behold:
"Warning: Contains a werewolf and a godling, prescient dreams, bloodthirsty monsters, annoying pets, (mostly) friendly witches, dark secrets, sex in hardwares, and meddling gods."


That's on the back cover. Someone saw that, read it, and thought "Yeah, this is a great thing to advertise this novel." A warning. How does one have sex in hardwares anyway? Do you mean you have sex inside a hardware? How do you have sex in a hardware? ... Never mind--not going to ask. Rule 34. Though when I read this part of the book, I discovered that the word missing from this sentence is department. So it should read: "Sex in a hardware department." That sounds sanitary. Totally not like millions of people haven't walked through there with their grubby unwashed hands and sticky fingers.

Allegedly, this book is an urban fantasy about a misfit kid and obviously involves werewolves.

Henry is a quiet kid who has been passed around through foster homes for much of his life and finds himself working in a warehouse-style store that sounds a lot like Home Depot, but they call it Larkin’s.  His favorite department is the Garden Center.  Why the author couldn’t call it Home Depot but feels comfortable referencing Chipotle, I will never know.  Most stories, particularly romances, have attractive main characters.  This is not always true, but it’s a general rule.  This is the first book I’ve read where a main character has "hairy ears" (75), hobbit feet (134), and a unibrow that’s canon though:

(26)  “... your eyebrows--they meet right here.”



Jamey is the love interest, a mysterious… new coworker.  He was kicked out of his apparently evangelical Christian household for being gay and begins the story living halfway in his car and halfway on a friend’s couch, though he has been overstaying his welcome.  He smells like mint soap, Tea Tree Tingle Shampoo, and Old Spice, which will be mentioned more than once.



They both have pointy ears.  Why do so many authors/filmmakers/storytellers always give supernatural creatures pointy ears?  It’s not human.  What should I do to make this character not human?  Scales?  Webbed fingers?  A tail?  Octopus-wa?  Nah, give ‘em pointed ears.  No human has ever been born with pointy ears except for all the ones born with cerebellar anomaly... which is doctor-speak for elf ears.


I am actually a faerie.

There is a third character mentioned consistently as well, but there really isn’t much to say about Ella other than “she exists” and that she is also some preternatural thing, though she knows what’s up, and these two are oblivious.  In fact, her character is the only one that throws a wrench in my theory that the werewolf thing is a schizophrenic hallucination, though I can also assume that she is part of the hallucination.

Chapter Uno


The story opens September 9th, 2009 in Richmond Virginia, and it states this.

In fact, it states the date and/or location every time we have a location and/or time change.  I’ve seen this used before--it’s not uncommon or even a bad thing and can be used to improve the story and eliminates narrative like “it had been a month since Jamey started working at Home Depot Larkin’s.”

Whether it is 2009 or not is also up for debate.  Were people really still reading newspapers in 2009?  Even weirder, neither of the main characters has a cell phone.  One of them even references trying to use a phone book to find the other’s number.  What year is it!?  Fine, maybe you don’t have a phone, but you mention libraries existing.  It would be so much more natural, this century, and so much more like a young adult to jump on a computer and look them up on Facebook rather than resort to a phone book.  Geez, man, set this in the 80s and this would have made more sense.

The way it is written has convinced me beyond doubt that the main character has synesthesia, from the way he says that shadows have colors and scents (1--”green shadows had the richest, the deepest, smell”), is incapable of carrying on a normal conversation (reference--every single “conversation” with Henry), is often overwhelmed by stimulus, "hears" color by the last couple chapters, and can smell emotions.  Smelling emotions is a common trope in this genre, so I will let that one go, but this character is constantly aware of smell in a way that the human brain generally can’t focus on for too long (this is actually a fascinating subject if you want to delve into it, but I won’t go there). I think the idea was to shove in our face that "Look, he isn't human--see? He's too aware of smell!" Color me unimpressed. If he had a compulsive need to mark his territory, that would be more unique as well as blatantly obvious he wasn't human.

The smelling emotions thing only gets worse as the book goes on. Later on, he not only "smells fear", which is too common for me to criticize overmuch, but he also smells desire (I'm going to assume that means he smells precum) and, by page 155, he can smell love and by page 169, he can smell if someone is unconscious. By the end of the book, he can smell what genitals people prefer too.

Most people, though, don’t run screaming because of a smell, no matter their age.

(16) “... when he ran screaming out of church, trying to escape the smells.”

The way other characters talk to him hints at him having a learning disability as well:

(44)  “But not a scary bad witch like the Wicked Witch in The Wizard of Oz, more like Glinda the Good.  Think of these as big four-leaf clovers that can protect you and Jamey from more than just werewolves…”

You talk like that to children, not a grown adult.  Maybe a grown adult with a learning disability.

(45) “When Henry had mentioned he had no phone to the nice librarian…”

Nice librarian?  He’s supposed to be 18.  Do you know any 18-year old who thinks and/or talks like this?

As a proclaimed lover of Mexican food, it is both shocking and appalling that Henry has never tasted its glory by the time he is an adult (25).  First off, how--and second, Chipotle is Americanized Mexican food, dude, and you mentioned that it was close to your workplace only a few pages ago.  What do you mean you don’t know what refried beans taste like and don’t know what a fajita is?

This madness only continues, for not only has he never had Mexican food, his poor American palate has never experienced the wonder and joy that is Indian food (31).  How?  HOW?  How can you survive and call yourself a man without ever experiencing curry?  This is a larger indication that he is inhuman than any of the schizophrenic nightmares preternatural experiences.

The only food this character eats and knows what it is are hot dogs.  He eats a disturbing amount of hot dogs throughout this book.  I get it, okay?  It’s phallic.  Two gay boys flirting with each other and eating phallic objects can pass as humor, but the author never goes there.  Do they put their lips against the hot dog, slide their mouth over it and sink their teeth into the meat, juice squirting in their mouths, and they pull the bitten off chunk into their wet mouth, chew, then swallow slowly, letting the pulpy mash fall down their throat, all while keeping eye contact with one another?  No?  Why the fuck not?



(12)  Rehearsing while he sorted his clothes at the Laundromat or rode the bus to and from Short Pump, or alone in the Garden Center, didn’t seem to help.  Some of the dogwood saplings had seemed especially interested, which he actually found annoying.

…  Plants were interested in listening to narrative?  Why?  How?  What the fuck? And he never thinks it's weird!

Another common fictional trope is that dreams have meanings, beyond our brains filing away our memories or anything else that science has proven about dreams.  Again, this is common and I will let it go, but it is unbelievably weird that two adults would both think that dreams have a special meaning, such as that they bring it up at work. Go into any pagan book store and you'll find a shit ton of books about dream interpretation, by the way, though it isn't exclusively pagan. Humans are just weirdly obsessed with attributing meaning to something mundane.

Fact:  Nobody cares about your dreams or your dream analysis.  If they pretend to care, they probably want something from you.  In this book’s case, Henry wants Jamey’s peen.

A common recurring dream for most people in real life is having their teeth fall out.  It’s impossibly common.  No one reacts the way these people do to having similar dreams.  I once had a dream I was trapped in my retail job and unable to leave with a bunch of angry customers yelling at me.  Why?  Possibly because that’s the life of retail and every retail worker ever has the same variation of nightmares because we are all part of a collective hivemind, obviously.


Now, page 13 actually made me smile, even if they did write an overall useless story as a flashback that I can’t imagine will ever be referenced again.  I think the author might have worked at a Home Depot hardware store before:

A woman last week had wanted to know what he thought about the colors she was considering for her son’s room.  He was about Henry’s age and she just wasn’t sure.  White with blue trim, but which white?  Dover White?  Pure or Westhighland?  White Duck, Narcissus, Dreamy.  She liked Dreamy, did he?

It continues on for another couple of sentences.  It is unimportant to the general plotline, but I feel the author kept it as a way to vent their own life.  Nice little window into their past.  Good for them.  The issue comes when the author does this very consistently, repeating the same idea only two pages later, on page 15.

The dark-haired woman kept talking, reciting the list of stores she had been to in Richmond:  Ferguson Bath & Kitchen Gallery, Richmond Plumbing Specialties…

We get it.  The target audience may be retail workers, for all that I know, but as an ex-retail worker, I get it.  You want to vent.  You feel you can connect to retail workers this way since you are no longer connected to the hivemind.  I fucking get it.  The one life insert was enough, but at least this one isn’t a flashback.

The werewolf parts are obviously a schizophrenic nightmare.  That part really begins on page 18, when Henry is working a graveyard shift and, exhausted, falls asleep on the floor of the handicap stall in the bathroom.  He wakes exactly where he left, except that he is naked.  His clothes are hanging neatly on the hook on the door.  There are twigs in his hair and what he suspects is grey fur in his teeth.  His socks and underwear are missing. Uh... sexy...?

The first chapter ends with a body being discovered outside of his job.

There are a few implications one could draw.  Going down the urban fantasy mythos, he killed them in werewolf form and has no memory of it.  This, too, is a common trope, so the author can have it--whatever.

My personal theory is that he’s a schizophrenic having hallucinations and finally flipped and murdered them, as before mentioned.  Honestly, seeing this as an schizo journal is much more interesting so far than reading it as-is.

Chapter Gemini


On page 38, there have been more dog attacks and people, being people, start talking about werewolves.  Yes, this is ridiculous, but people are just as quick to start believing in ghosts because a cabinet door opens “by itself” so don’t be surprised.  Fine, there are dog attacks.  Again, schizophrenic hallucinations, coupled with real-life issues means that he’s out of his fucking mind.

As for the actual writing style, Rochelle has a tendency to tell and not show, which is a fairly common pitfall in writing but one that could be easily remedied.  If I were doing shots for every time I read “maternal severance package”, though, I’d have had about four shots by page 32.  It was cute the first time, and I don’t mind it mentioned, but the complaint here stems from an explanation of what it was and why Jamey has it only needs to be said once, not repeated every time it is mentioned.  Your target audience isn’t Kindergarten, Rochelle.  We can remember things that were said a few pages ago.

On page 33, lightning strikes a truck parked on the other side of a parking lot of a pizza parlor where our two protagonists are.  This entire event is limited to 4 sentences here, and a page later, there is a short paragraph about the fire this started.  I’m sorry, in real life, you not only notice that shit, you run out of your car, gape at it, yell, and probably talk about this incident for the rest of your life (and whip out your phone to take pictures, but these two don’t have phones--Ultra Hipster).  These characters are too self-absorbed for that.

Pictured:  Not as interesting as flirting badly.

Every time the two main characters go on a date, when Henry gets home, he strips off all his clothes, stands in front of a mirror and… pokes at himself wherever Jamey touched him (34).  That’s a human thing to do, yes?  This is the most boring thing a naked character in front of a mirror could do aside from explain how they look.

…  Gay sex manual… at Barnes & Noble.  In 2009.  I really think these characters don’t know what the internet is.  (35)

The hour-long drive north on 98 to Fredericksburg might as well have been in Antarctica. (37)

I have no idea what that phrase means.  It says it was at the end of summer.  Did they have a major snowstorm?  Was it just that cold?  What? I think the author is trying to say that it was "still and silent and metaphorically cold" but I'm going to assume Jamey and his daddy were both shivering and hunting polar bears.

Wild birds don’t nod.  (39)

Yes and no, actually.  Nodding (bobbing the head) is a baby gesture birds use when they want food.  So, yes, they do nod.  They grow out of it. An adult wild bird wouldn't nod though, so, yeah--sure. Why does your badly educated main character know this? That seems incredibly out of place.

On page 39, the character starts to think he might be a werewolf.  Not in a “I have identifiable proof” kind of way, but in a “huh--if I’m a supernatural being, that explains my dreams and why my body is sore”.


What the fuck is wrong with you, Henry?  No one (in their right mind) assumes that “oh, I’m anemic.  I must be being attacked by a vampire”.  Look, I know your education was terrible and you were passed around from foster home to foster home like a Taiwanese hooker, but are you really this gullible?  This is why it’s so important to teach kids how to think, be skeptical, and be able to reason.  Where’s the logic!?

Then, it escalates:  He tells himself over and over that he might be a werewolf (39).  He convinces himself that he might be a werewolf.  He needs a freaking doctor.  Probably a few of them. But, oh, he gets a "doctor" all right...

“The Internet?  I don’t know, that sounds sort of scary.”  (39)

Seriously, page 39 has been a wonderland of wtf.  I’m sorry, dude.  Allegedly, you’re like 18 in 2009.  You did not graduate high school in America without using the internet.  And what kind of dystopian universe is this?  In this universe, it hints that Obama did not get elected (“the man was weak, not like the presidents before him, his brother and father” 39) and instead it was… that other Bush guy?  So am I to believe that under the continued Bush dynasty, he plunges America into a dystopian world where the internet and cellphones are some scary thing to millennials?

... Oh holy fucking Odin on a Wednesday, suddenly it makes sense.

(45) “Email was more expensive than an Internet account, never mind the background checks.”

Da fuq?

The author tries to smooth over this by citing religion.  Maybe every single foster family he was passed around to was so deeply religious that they paid for him to go to a private school that didn’t have devil machines computers. Page 40 does explain that his foster families thought computers were sinful.  Really, every single one of them? I know some Christians, even Young Earth Creationist Christians, who play WoW.

Dude, if you want to lean on the severe religious upbringing and computers and cellphones are scary, make the character more religious.  He obviously isn’t religious.  It’s just a bunch of “Henry was taught” such and such.  He doesn’t buy it. Rochelle never says this explicitly, but it's plain from his actions and his POV. He doesn't think something is evil; he just says that's what other people say.  Growing up, I was taught that Pokemon came from Satan and you needed to be abstinent until marriage.  Did I believe it?  No.  When I ditched the religion, those were some of the first ideas I scrapped.  Henry is simply an unbelievable character.  If he doesn’t believe the religion, why on earth does he continue to believe what the religious people keep saying to him?   “Hmm, I don’t believe in the invisible sky wizard, but maybe they’re right that the internet is bad, mmkay?”  True, the internet is for porn, but most Jesus people will justify their use of computers because there’s godly things on there as well, like WoW apparently--personal anecdote. (The real reason is still the porn.)

I really think the author is severely out of touch and genuinely needed to push the setting back a decade or two.  I was in grade school in the 90s.  We had a computer in the classroom (two Apples--I remember them distinctly).  In every classroom, down to Kindergarten, I used a computer.  It was a very small town with very few students.  Most people there were religious.  Sorry, Rochelle.  No cookie.

If Jamey knew he had such crazy dreams, he would want Henry to go away.” (41)

The language here is infantile.  Who thinks like this?

“Both times got we rained out.” (42)

This is something Henry actually says out loud. It is offensive to autistic people to say that Henry could be autistic at this point.

43-44.  Dr. Melloy is Henry’s landlady.  A doctor of what, I have no idea, because it certainly isn’t medicine.  A quick google revealed to me that while it is illegal to practice medicine without being a licensed physician, it is legal in some places (in the US) to claim to be a doctor so long as they aren't offering medical advice.  Considering the below paragraph…  Well, come to your own conclusions.

Of course he’d have an older mentor who believes in the paranormal somewhere nearby.  She’s a professor who teaches medieval literature (high priority, very competitive field in high demand, I’m sure).  I’m also sure that it pays more than well enough for her to afford her library of a house filled with antique medieval armor, swords, and other such crap.  We all know that every professor ever, especially one as distinguished as an English professor makes that much money.  Someone reading this is probably an English professor sitting in a shack and crying.  You know who you are.

I just looked up average pay and it's about 68 grand a year. She lives alone with no kids, so that might account for some of it. It's not exactly rolling in money though. I wonder how quickly her house would go up in flames with all the books--fire safety and all that. Fahrenheit 451!

"I've got a lot of gay friends and after a while, you sort of sense it." (42)



What the fuck, lady?  I realize that most gay people sweat glitter and fart rainbows, but you shouldn’t just assume shit like that about people.  At least say something ambiguous like, “Who was he?  He’s cute.  Blah, blah.  Are you two seeing each other?”  Not this “I know your dirty secret” bull shit.

When Henry confesses his dreams and feelings for Jamey to her, what does she do?  Does she suggest he seek therapy?  Maybe go to an LGBT support group, because he’s clearly struggling with his past abuse and neglect and could really use a fucking support network?

No.  She goes down to her pagan altar and sprinkles oil on two pentacles.  Ugh--just ugh. Because real help is that icky scary science stuff, we'll stick with the woo. This shit gets people killed in real life.

From my perspective, he’s having a psychotic break and instead of helping him like a sane, rational human being, Melloy makes it worse by feeding into his psychosis.  What the fuck!?  No rational person would do this.  Why would you make this worse?  What the fuck, lady?

I know, I get it--okay?  Skeptics ruin everything and of course pagan people can be doctors.  But you are a shitty person and an even worse doctor if you think sprinkling oil on a pendant is going to help anything and giving that to a kid who is clearly struggling is just a shitty thing to do.  This just makes real pagans look bad. Ugh--right. Magic is real in book world under the Bush dystopia.

And yet, somehow, Jamey doesn’t really think it’s weird when Henry wants him to wear the necklace.

Actual plot commentary:  Ella has been sending out “warnings” in the form of lightning strikes.  This has several issues.  For one thing, she just assumes that whoever is getting the warning would know what it means.  Maybe she is so accustomed to that that this is what she expects, but they didn’t heed the first two, so one would logically assume at this point that maybe her intended did not understand the message.  Any logical person would think that.  But not Ella.  No, so she sends a third lightning bolt (44).  And, while her message didn’t exactly get across (gee, I wonder why), she did warn our lovebirds away from one another.

This lightning bolt strikes a tree and it “burned like a great torch” (45).  Yet the main character never really reacts to this.  How do you not react to this?  HOW!?

Jamey takes it as a sign from the Almighty that he needs to be scared straight. No one calls the fire department, even the neighbors.

(45) Henry stood in the driveway a long time, waiting, but Jamey didn’t come back.”

WITH THE TREE ON FIRE RIGHT FUCKING THERE!?

Barely worth noticing.


The worst part is that, at this point, there is sufficient evidence to suggest that he murdered people and this never seems to phase him. He never freaks out that he might have murdered human beings. It's like the author started going down that route and decided to ignore that inconvenient plot hole later on. Why does he never have some existential crisis that he murdered people? I can't stress that enough--that's so ridiculous. Any normal human is going to freak out over the possibility that they are a murderer, and he is so self-centered that this never even crosses his damned mind.


And we’re only 2 chapters in.  You know it’s only going to get worse.

Chapter Threesome


(47) “Henry had barely nodded when Jamey showed up a few minutes late…”

I don’t know what this phrase means.  “Barely nodded?” He wasn't talking to anyone--is this some kind of Rust Belt slang?

Another thing I don’t understand is why the managers always go up to Henry and tell him the schedule.  Any place I have ever worked (that had a weekly changing schedule), the schedule is your responsibility to look at.  This is just another reason I think he’s mentally handicapped.  On pages 47-48 the manager even tells Henry twice in the same conversation what his schedule/duties are.

On page 51…  Somehow, magically, “Dr.” Melloy can “tell” that Henry is wearing his pentacle.  Urban fantasy.  Right.  Magic is real.  Right.  Sorry, book, but if magic and spell casting were real things and all it required was being pagan, a lot more people would be pagan in this book’s world, though later on it hints that i is hereditary, but never really says it outright.  I mean, seriously, google search “Wicca”.  I’ll wait.


You see the millions of results and how easy it would be to follow?  Exactly.  All Melloy would have to do is prove that her magic is a real thing.  There’s a million-dollar prize for whoever can prove the paranormal is real.  Do you honestly think there is a single “witch” in this book who didn’t think “Hmm, I think I’d like easy money and world fame”?  Nope--conspiracy “we all have to keep it a secret because the evil government/secret society will stick us in laboratories or murder us” is sooo much more likely.

But Selana, you say, this conspiracy is true!  Of course the government can do things like abduct people and keep them in secret underground bunkers while they do experiments on them!

…  To which I say, fucking Watergate.  Leaked by a janitor.  Just sayin’.

The conspiracy in this book is that there is a secret organization called “the Watchers” who hunt down and kill preternatural critters that risk exposing themselves to the general public (53).

52--Jamey refers to the pentacle as a “star”.  He clearly has no idea what it is.  You can blame religion for that, this book clearly does, but I grew up in a CRAZY evangelical household where Pokemon come from the devil.  I knew what a pentacle was.  I didn’t know the history of the symbol or what it meant, but I knew it was “bad”.  Why do I know that?  The deceased Jack Chick put them ALL OVER the Chick Tracts that it even says in Chapter 1 Jamey has a stockpile of.  What the hell, book?  You aren’t even internally consistent.


This is from the infamous Dark Dungeons Chick Tract

And then they have sex, without lube or condoms (I genuinely hope it was just 69 or something) on page 54.  While on the clock in the hardware store working the night shift.  I guess security cameras didn’t exist in 2009?  And managers never check in on their workers.  I mean, if you were a little mom and pop store, sure, but the way it is described, this is a large store, which would have lots of small high-priced items.  Sorry, no--security cameras exist.  In the real world, you two are soooo fired.

All the same, I hope they used a washing machine as a prop.

Apparently, they fell asleep after sex and when Jamey wakes up, he is naked and alone.  As idiots do.  Henry is gone, his "star necklace" is sitting on the clipboard, and a wolf is growling at him.  So, dream fulfillment:  Jamey runs naked through the store.  This part is genuinely hilarious, but it seems like Rochelle was aiming for "scary"; when you're naked, you're vulnerable and all that jazz, but it's not written in a way that inspires fear--just awkward slapstick that the author thought was scary.

Finally, Jamey encounters their shift manager, Eduardo.  He says he's going to "fire your naked ass".  I actually chuckled aloud at that.  It's so refreshing to see someone react almost like a real human.

According to page 56, Jamey figured out that werewolves were real and Henry was one because of the wolf's ears and its eyes.  Bitch, your boyfriend is really fucking ugly if you can piece that together in two sentences.

So anyway, the wolf noses up to him and he puts the "star necklace" around its neck and... embraces the wolf, wrapping his arms and legs around it.

... Not gonna go there.

Henry turns back and they both get wood.

Did I mention there's two police officers right in front of Jamey?  Yeah, someone called the cops.  Kinky.

The cops insist they stand up, so they do.  The cops apparently decide that they didn't see Henry transform (to be fair, it's really vague on when the cop showed up, despite that the cop claims he saw the wolf) and then they yell at Eduardo about calling them.  Just as a friendly reminder, Jamey and Henry are standing naked in the flooring section with hard-ons, two police officers, and their shift manager.  Why are they not more embarrassed?  Why are they not grabbing floor tiles to hold in front of their dicks?  You'd think the mortal embarrassment and terror of getting their asses sooooo fired would be an insta-kill for a boner, but no.  I suppose that's fair, though--they are both under 20.

One of the cops calls them "two homos" and the other one calls him out for using slurs and reminds him of his sensitivity training.  In Richmond, Virginia.  Lol.

Eduardo starts praying fervently in Spanish and the lights flicker as the boys get more and more agitated.  Then birds appear, as if from no where.  Eduardo freaks out and bowls into the cops.  One of the "cups" (grammatical error, but it was amusing) shoots wildly at the birds.  This sequence is not described very well.  Rochelle cares a lot more about the characters' relationships than any of the action, so the action, despite that there is some, is always downplayed for how Henry or Jamey feels about their relationship.  As a result, we get about four sentences describing this event.

The boys take advantage of the confusion and run away.

Melloy appears for some reason and ushers the two naked kids into the parking lot.  Despite that Henry has been renting from her and living on her property, she tells him that her car is the Hyundai.  Why doesn't Henry just know this?  What am I saying--he has no knowledge of automobiles of any kind.

Something funny that I see exclusively in books with pagan characters is that instead of saying things like "oh my god" they say "gods".  Never, not once, have I heard a pagan do this in real life without "doing it on purpose".  Sorry, just a product of our culture.  I'm an atheist, and say shit like that all the time--it's really just a phrase or figure of speech at this point.

She never questions why they're both naked and blames herself for not giving them more "protection" (58).  Apparently, the pentacles function like a tracking device and she intuitively knows that Henry is a werewolf and Jamey is half-god or some shit.

On page 60, the boys sit under a blanket in the back of Melloy's car as she speeds toward her house.  They use the opportunity to feel each other up, as ya do.

I've said before that I think it's a schizophrenic nightmare, so here's my interpretation:  The boys fuck on shift.  Jamey, in a weird daze, wanders away and past Eduardo.  Henry follows after him.  Eduardo calls the "cups" to deal with their garbage because they weren't listening to him and fuck-it-I'm-not-paid-enough-for-this.  The cops, too, are displeased.  Henry assaults the cops and runs away with Jamey.  Melloy happened to be there, as she was in the area and decided to pick Henry up after work, give him a ride home, all that.  She meets them there and, seeing Henry having a psychotic break, took the two boys home with her.

You tell me which sounds most likely.

Ella the Watcher does a memory wipe, like a more violent and less sciencey version of the kind in Artemis Fowl.  It never mentions security cameras.  That pesky technology.


I imagine that Warren Rochelle sits on the porch shaking a fist at "young people and your phones--back in my day..."

They get to her place and she... packs up her altar.  If pagans are super into their religion, they tend to have mini-sets in their cars, but what the fuck ever.  She viewed her altar as more important than books handed down in her family for generations or her toothbrush.

The Watchers set her house on fire and all the books go up in flames, which amuses me because only a few paragraphs ago, I wondered about the potential fire hazard from this.

The fire department shows up (but not for the tree that was set on fire apparently) and they floor it out of there.  Nope, totally not going to look awkward or like you set your own house on fire to cover up evidence of a crime.  Not suspicious at all.

So apparently, the reason no witch has squealed about magic in this world is because the Watchers will kill them.  Again, crazy fucking conspiracy.  The more people involved, the more likely you are to get a Snowden.


Or a janitor.

They go to a house and Melloy points out that Henry now has a familiar, which is a raven.  That's kind of... unique at least.  According to a google search, wolves and ravens seem to get along okay, so this at least plays into the story.

He just accepts it as totally normal when the bird lands on his shoulder.  Speaking as someone typing this with a bird on their lap, you don't want unclipped birdy talons on your bare skin.  Also, most people, even people who like birds, will kind of freak out if one flies up to you and lands on your shoulder.  I guess it's something about a winged thing the size of your head, coming out of no where, that close to your face.

At the house, there are a few cats and a dog.  One of the cats gets to the door.  It opens, revealing the other animals, who bark, hiss, and meow at one another as if having a deep discussion.

Illustrated children's book.

The old woman who owns the house, who Rochelle dubbed "the Keeper" (her name is Bonnie) finally gets to the door.  Apparently, all of her animals are sentient and she talks to them.  Later on in the book, it implies that all animals are sentient and talk to witches.  Disturbing, considering that they eat meat.

The Keeper offers them frozen pizza and Henry, being Henry, can't eat anything that comes from a non-English speaking country.  He requests a PB&J (71).  They give the raven bird seed.  Ravens eat almost anything, but bird seed isn't all that great for large birds--too high in sugar and calories and isn't filling enough for them.  Not to mention seed husks everywhere.

"We really should figure out a way to make cell phones work in a house with magic protective spells in place." (71)

What are physics?

Jamey is so shocked that she has a cell phone that he's frightened at the very concept of being near one.  The witches snort with superiority about this and make noises about that being a Puritan belief.  Dude, most Christians in America have Puritan roots in their faith.  They have cell phones.  What the fuck even?

Oh, right, dystopian alternate history urban fantasy, Jeb Bush President instead of Obama means all Christians fear technology.  Right.

"A pale tune, white and lemon yellow"... (72)

Again, I keep saying Henry has mental issues.

He also doesn't like chocolate chip cookies (80) because chocolate is bad for canines.  So is a lot of other shit he eats, but whatever.  At least the author firmly established he isn't human.

The witches convene.  There's some garbage about how they "look like customers"--because a retail slave's life begins and ends at work.  It is known.


The witches call Henry "a Pet" without explaining what it means exactly.  For some reason, Henry never demands an explanation of terminology or why the fuck someone would keep a human/sentient werewolf as a pet, but whatever.


They go down to the basement and the witches are all either in robes or naked, standing around waiting for a spell to be cast or something.  Jamey describes walking into the room as the naked witches watch him being like "walking through a curtain of rice" (83).



Rice.

So I assume it felt sticky and warm and like there were thousands of them all over his body.  Like semen.

So anyway, the witches chant and do a spell.  Jamey starts having a panic attack brought on by Christian upbringing--that's fair.

So, my take so far:  That house was a fire hazard.  It went up in smoke.  Melloy took the boys to a friend's place.  They're Wiccan and their coven comes over to do a spell.  The boys end up watching.

Woo--we learn what "Pets" are.  They were created by the gods (they have many names; this is repeated several times) when the gods grew bored with humankind.  They insist that Hercules and all those other stories were real.  Very rational way of thinking, I'm sure.  Space Zeus and his cronies peaced out when "whatever was chasing them caught up".  So apparently, there's something more powerful than these gods.  This will never be explained or expanded upon.  Moreover, Space Zeus left the Watchers to make sure that the muggles never got wind of the supernatural.  Why, it never gets into.  Jamey and Henry were prophesied and their destiny is to find the Magic Space Loki Key that can destroy the Watchers and set magic free upon all the land.  Also, the Christian church and all of science are a Watcher conspiracy.  (85-87)

Very internally consistent.  They said pages ago that a fear of technology was "Puritan."

"They operate in secret, disguised in government, in churches, and schools."

Separation of religion and government!

"Learning, knowledge, is feared and hindered, avoided."

Uh-huh.  That's why more people are educated now than there has ever been.  Sure, book.  You make no fucking sense.  Ah, right--dystopia.  Jeb Bush president, whatever.

"We fear a long list of things, from cell phones to computers, the Internet, cameras, telescopes."

No, Melloy, you fear that shit because you're secretly Amish at heart.  That's why you have a fucking cell phone and a laptop.  And I guarantee you're not a professor at any university without using a computer, you techno-phobic goon.

All of this is done in exposition in the most boring way possible.  It never explains why these things need to be feared.  It just says "fear them" and I guess the reader is never supposed to question why.  Well, Rochelle, why?  "Doctor" Melloy didn't get her doctorate by avoiding a computer and the Internet.  Cameras don't steal your fucking nonexistent soul.  And... telescopes?  What the fuck--telescopes?

Maybe my real complaint is semantics--they should just say "some people" or something, not "we", because Henry and Jamey's Christian cult upbringing feared that shit, but the witches don't seem to.

Jamey throws a bit of a temper tantrum and the witches literally lock him in his room.

Also, the coven house is bigger on the inside.

To quote Aurelio Voltaire, once you've felt it inside, I'm sure that you'll agree.

The pagans remain inconsistent.  They say one time that there are gods and goddesses, then in the next say they weren't really gods and more like aliens.  Why worship something like that?  I don't fucking get it--why bother?  You just said they abandoned you, that they're not gods--why do you worship this nonsense?

I think the author fucked up an edit--one character cuts off another and tells a different character that they can discuss theology another time (94).

Henry says his first intelligible sentence in the entire book on page 95.  In summary, he insists that all his life he's "known" when moments were "special" like some kind of prophet werewolf.  Funny, this is the first time it's ever mentioned and it's for nothing but a plot device.  He also goes right back to his infantile sentences and thought processes, saying after their big adventure to find the Loki Key, he could go back to working at the hardware store.

Dude, I don't think you realize they won't hire you again.  That's what happens when you fuck someone on shift and then go streaking through the store.

They decide to go find the Loki Key and the witches start "training" them.  I assume this involves clicker training and doggy snacks.

I would assume wrong--it involves nakedness.

Kinky.

I hate it when authors do shit like "X is smart--he's the best detective ever" then have them do stupid shit.  Similarly, it is utter crap to say "Henry wasn't bothered by the cold" 97 pages into the book, back it up with "he walked around in November barefoot outside".  Almost 100 pages in, I could have learned this inherently in prose, but  the author never takes that route.

Lists.  I don't need a list for every food Henry consumes.  I already know it will be pure American cuisine because Space Athena forbid any "ethnic" foods should ever grace his highly discerning palate.

Henry wonders why a witch would want a motorcycle and one of them decides to become highly offended at the idea, going off on a tangent about how "witches don't fly on broomsticks" despite that he made no conclusions that they did.  But, hey, none of the other characters act logical--why should she?

Their training consists of learning the "symbolic language of dreams" through "lucid and guided instructional dreaming", then staring deeply into memories to awaken secrets hidden away in their cells.

"Inscribed in their DNA."  (99)

What the fuck.  I'm sorry, no.  Rochelle is trying to make paganism sound like it's scientific.  You sound like a Creationist saying Noah's Ark is scientific.  No--you sound worse.  You sound like you've lost your mind and, moreover, know nothing about cells and DNA.

Then this gem:  "This sounded like the kind of science stuff his mother claimed came from Satan."  (99)

No, Jamey, dearest, no it doesn't.  It sounds like bull shit.  No, it's worse because bull shit is at least useful for manure.  This is utter and complete garbage.  It has no use or purpose.  It is poorly conceived, made-up word garbage to try to sound scientific.  Well, you fail.  You fucking fail.  Just stick with magic, dude.  I appreciate what you're trying to do, but don't fucking say that you're scared of science on one page, then try to claim they're doing science-magic on the next.  It's not science.  Just stop.  Fucking stop.

"Grant me the wish this work to find."  (99)

Part of a spell  Just word garbage.

There is an incredibly long and painfully boring dream sequence.  Why do so many authors rely on this trope?  Do you remember the last dream you dreamed in painfully vivid detail, down to what "color the dark was"?  Neither do I.

Of course, he's sleep learning, which is totally not made-up nonsense.

Alphas work hard.  I'm glad I'm a Beta...

Great way to skip all the boring "you have to learn to control your powers" nonsense that litters so many (better) books.

I don't think Rochelle has ever met a real human being:  "They take advantage of people's desire for, and belief in, a world that makes sense, that is logical and orderly."  (108)

Rochelle, you do realize how many people, just in America, that are young earth Creationists?  You call that "logical and orderly"?  You realize how many people buy into conspiracy theories?  You realize how many people believe utter and complete nonsense with no proof whatsoever, buying into logical fallacies left and right?  How easy it is to convince people that a place is haunted or that ghosts exist?  You know how many people just believe in an afterlife they have no evidence for?  Sorry, my lovely little word scrabbler, no.  Human beings don't do that.  I genuinely wish they did though.

It goes ultra conspiracy theory-ish here:  "It's even worse what they have done to make it almost impossible for people to find out the truth, to get in touch with other people who have seen the same kinds of things."  (108)


It's apparently mandatory that Jamey has a sword to fight the Watchers, because only a sword can do damage to them.  While I know this is purely for style and aesthetics, the author poorly explains this in a Terry Goodkind-esque "magic against magic" type of way.  They say that the swords can be "spelled" and other such garbage, but why can't a handgun and some bullets?  Rochelle offers no further explanation to this.

So they set out to do some poorly-explained but for some reason important ritual right at dawn by a river.  They never explain what they had intended to do, and it must not have been particularly important because shit goes down and interrupts them and this will never be brought up as needing to get done again.  So, they do "magic" for plot advancement no discernible reason, never mentioning why the location is important (it's so they're out of the safe house protection).  One of the witches turns on everyone and tries to kill them, so to escape, Jamey teleports them somewhere else.

Chapter Sex Sec Six

On page 115, Rochelle falls into a terrible pit.  In this pit, characters voice everything they see and do.  Jamey teleported them to, for some reason, Charley's (his roommate's) place.  Charley reacts by shouting about who they are, where they came from, then describes what he saw in a relatively calm, rational manner in a way that not at all reflects how normal humans might react to bloody naked people being teleported into their living room.  This would be more realistic if he were, say, asleep when this happened because Rochelle describes it as being extremely early in the morning and he is, after all, a college student.

Apparently, Charley's other roommate, Al who is mentioned in name only, has a new computer in his room, which scares Jamey with its existence.  "He had no idea Al came from a family that could afford such a luxury and believed such things weren't evil."  (116).  Dystopian alternate history.  Anyone in/from Virginia want to offer some insight here?  2009 was not that long ago and most people even then had a personal computer and I have never met anyone in real life that thinks they're evil.

"Computers are evil, use them at the risk of your soul.  If you must use one, directly or indirectly, always pray before and after."  (116)

Advice to live by.  You be sure to get on your knees and clasp your hands in prayer, too.  I know I say "Oh, god, oh Jesus" when that happens.

Rochelle adds another meaningless list, this one only in a wandering thought of Jamey's.  Seriously, staaahp.

"Magic is a term for deeper knowledge of how the universe works."  (117)

Yeah, no.  Magic is a bull shit, nonexistent thing that humans made up.  This is an urban fantasy book though, so you get to make magic have your own internal rules, but please keep things consistent.  Again, stop trying to make magic scientific.  You're bad at it; just stop.  Next you'll use the "if only we could use 100% of our brains" nonsense.  Fantasy gets away with saying "it's magic--stop applying science to it" by using the "magic" card but even that follows a formula.

Jamey bursts into tears like a 7 year old boy when someone kicks his puppy while asking Melloy how she feels about her boyfriend's metamorphosing into a Watcher.  This sounds so much more interesting than the main story, and they just dismiss it in a few sentences with an "oh, the Watchers act like sleeper agents--they don't even know they are Watchers" blah blah.

"So I guess all this witch werewolf and magic stuff is real."  (118)

Somehow, Charley boy, I don't think you were the most educated or skeptical person in the world.  Yeah, three people and a bird just materialized bloody and naked in your living room, but you are remarkably calm throughout this and accept it with barely a fuss.  No, "omg--I must be hallucinating" or "omg aliens" or any of that.  Just "yeah, okay--magic."  You know what?  I'm just going to assume he's on drugs.

I still think Jamey and/or Henry are having a schizophrenic nightmare.  Their childish prose never changes and they continue to talk like children, Henry worse than Jamey.

Warren Rochelle has a definite idea in mind for things the characters should say.  The trouble is that the characters are juvenile idiots with a poor educational background.  This leads to a previously inarticulate character saying something, comparatively, educated and almost profound (by this book's standards) using words on a much higher reading level than they had used previously, even in prose.  In essence, it becomes disjointed and has been happening with increasing regularity.  Rochelle really needs to learn to reword phrases to sound like the characters speaking, but that might be asking for proof reading skills.

They come to the conclusion that the Space Loki Key is in London and Jamey needs to teleport he and Henry there.  They conclude to space it out from city to city by staring at pictures of these places.  This is how some authors have their characters time travel by accident, for the record.

"Study the Internet photos" is an incredibly stupid phrase.  Not only is it redundant, it's asinine.  It's a photo that someone uploaded to the internet somewhere--why is it an "Internet photo" and why is "internet" always capitalized?  Just googled this--apparently capitalization of the word is so controversial it has its own article on Wikipedia and it's mostly an American thing.  Opinion:  It's weird to capitalize it because it's not a person, place, title, or business--it's a network.  We'll see how it plays out in the future.  Stuck on semantics...

Melloy has to repeatedly convince the boys that computers aren't inherently evil.  Sooo cringey.  They're afraid to even touch the computer, yet the plan is to send them all over the world.  I'd love to see them stuck in downtown Tokyo.  Come on, do it, Rochelle.  Let's see that panic attack!

Melloy pulls some tea out of her ass that she spells and gives to the boys to help them sleep.  Seriously, she did not find this tea in a college kid's apartment--few enough of them drink tea, let alone bitter tea.  It is a useless piece of the prose that makes no sense whatsoever to include.  It adds no value to the story and should, frankly, have been cut.  Or is it foreshadowing and the tea does something weird?  Please do something weird.  Have Mysterious Roommate Al be a "sleeper agent Watcher" who left the tea as some kind of intricate plot device.

Sleeper Agent Tea Terrorist!

Hehehe--I'll put this tea here in the vague and statistically improbable hope that Jamey will drink it.  Devious!

Again, props where it's due:  The characters go to sleep and there are a couple stupid paragraphs detailing dreams and their sleeping habits, which is so terribly interesting.  Then, two sentences about the Watchers:  "The Watchers didn't sleep.  They hunted."  Very good--adds some drama in a "less is more" sense.  I guarantee you won't keep that up.

They panic-teleport to the witch safe house thing and Charley is dragged along for the ride, poor thing.  Does he freak out about the teleporting?  Nope--just acts like it's a normal thing.  Instead, he tells Jamey "it's the real thing" in regards to his feelings for Henry.  I'm calling bull shit.  He might have seen Jamey reacting to dating Henry, but he has seen them together for less than a day and they pretty much avoided one another the whole time.  This is exactly as stupid as books where characters say "Oh, he's head over heels for you!" when they've seen the two of them together once and he's been indifferent to her the entire time.  I'm not buying it, Rochelle.

On to Chapter Gas Station Slurpee!

So they space out the "Jumps" (capital J), and eventually make it to the British Museum.  It takes about a page and a half of completely useless prose.  Seriously?  I was honestly expecting shenanigans during this time that would cause a major detour.  If they were going to make it there no problem, needing to teleport to random places first is, once again, useless.  In fact, nonsensical.  Why not use the time for added drama--Jamey can't remember what the next "Jump" location is or something?  No, instead we have a useless teleportation sequence that adds nothing to the overall story.

Browsing the museum looking for a key, Henry makes the revelation that he doesn't remember much before Kindergarten, as if that's terribly unique.  Jamey reacts to this as if its tragic.

I assume they were just going to pull a heist on the museum to rob the key.  Again, this would have been more interesting than the book has been so far, but I'm willing to bet this is above and beyond Rochelle's imagination.

Any time the characters know something in prose about their own magic, they point out that "Melloy said x".  Frankly, it is absurd that a witch knows so much about a fae and a werewolf.  It's like going to a Catholic priest to learn about Buddha--what the fuck?  And Rochelle just shakes jingly keys at you in the hopes you'll forget how ridiculous it is that she knows everything about their own powers, despite not having them herself.  This is the cheapest plot hole filler that has ever existed and Rochelle uses it like Americans use concrete--it's fucking everywhere, down to "she gave me a key" to the safe house.  Seems she thought of absolutely everything and told you everything you ever needed to know for this quest--how could she ever have known exactly everything you would need, I will never guess.  Waste no time and all that, she must have been cramming "knowledge" into their heads like a fourteen-year-old downloads porn.

Again, I think they're hallucinating and at this point and wandering around their own city in a daze.
Henry feels the need to point out that he's never seen the ocean "except in pictures and on TV and in movies" (139) when they go to the next safe house in their hallucinogenic dream Cornwall.  This is just another reason Henry's thinking is childlike--of course TV and photos don't fucking count, and why do you need to list TV and movies separately?  Why list them at all?  You could just say "in real life".  That would sound less like a six-year-old talking.

And what makes a TV fundamentally different than a cell phone or laptop?  It's all wires and electronics--why was it just fine and dandy for them to watch television, but not okay to use a computer or a cell phone?  No internal logic at all!

They get into the safe house and no one seems to be there.  There's a newspaper regarding Iraq and how Borders is staving off financial collapse--that one actually took me a minute and then I remembered:  Ha, yeah--they're gone now.

Ella tortured and killed Charley and for some reason felt the need to summon demons in a churchyard and torment the churchgoers.  This is completely useless to the plot and serves only as "see, she's evil" rather than serving any point ("delicious sounds of humans screaming" 141).  It's also internally inconsistent:  She's supposed to care the most about leaving no evidence of magic and not exposing herself and now she just exposed herself and a bunch of demons and whatever to regular boring humans.  Humans who, in 2009, all had camera phones.  She also tortured and killed people and left their bodies lying around (by which I mean Roommate Charley).  Roommate Charley had apparently gone to church on Sunday, bright and early at 8:00 AM, as most college students are wont to do.  ... I have never met a single college student who does this who isn't earning a degree in bullshit in seminary.

Rochelle covers over this with a simple "no one will believe them" line, but once again, I point to the fact that every single person there would have had a camera phone and that there are a bunch of little craters all around the church from the demons clawing their way through the parking lot.  People dismiss claims of the supernatural because there is no evidence for it.  You can make crazy rules in your book all you want, but fuck--stay consistent about those rules.  Your characters make no fucking sense.  You just made a character who "is evil" for no apparent reason.  She started off being more "meh" toward humans and still making some effort into covering up their operations, however poor (never seems to get that cameras exist) to terrorizing a bunch of humans for no real point or purpose, beyond the author pointing and saying "see, she's evil".  Sloppy writing--easiest way to make a character evil is have them torture and kill people, even if it isn't particularly meaningful to the plot.

The boys go down to play on the beach at the UK safe house because who cares that people are dying for them and they're being hunted, right?

A word on language here:  Rochelle uses the term "pack" instead of "backpack" during this scene, more than once.  It's fine in a "period" setting, but it is out of place in something set as recently as 2009, but something tells me that Rochelle is a bit out of touch anyway.

They play Frisbee, with Henry in wolf form.

Like this.

Ella continues breaking character and flies over the Atlantic, the little demons terrorizing transatlantic jet passengers as they go.  So much for subtlety.

The demons smell them (no fucking wonder--they made no effort to hide) and the raven wakes Jamey and Henry up.  It proceeds to land on Henry's bare shoulder and peck at his skin and hair while shrieking.  They can be quite loud, for the record.

I assume his shoulder is torn to hell.

And don't even get me started on their beak--they use it for tearing apart flesh.  And before someone who has a pet corvid lays into me about this, your pet bird isn't wild.  You and I both know you clip its toenails.

More dialogue that is more reminiscent of young children--seriously, at this point, it's not even worth pointing out.

I hate it when authors do this shit:  "They saw them and heard them." (146)

We know it's in reference to the Watchers, but fucking describe what is seen and heard.  We know the characters can hear it if you describe the sound--that's a given.  We know they can see it if it has a visual description.  So fucking describe it!  The best we get is that it's a "fast-moving cloud".  A fluffy white cumulus cloud?  Maybe shaped like a bunny?

So the demons attack and Henry shapeshifts and Jamey attacks with his sword.  There's a brief mention of people screaming and car doors slamming, then three police officers show up outside the safe house.  Frankly, all of this happens entirely too quickly to be remotely believable even within the confines of an urban fantasy book.  For plot reasons, the officers shoot Henry in wolf form and are completely unphased by the demons flying around in the air and decide to shoot the wolf.  Again, I don't think Warren Rochelle has ever met a human.  Why are they not terribly distracted by the fucking demons?  Yeah, a wolf and a naked kid with a sword is super weird, but most people would look at a wolf and assume it's a big dog, especially in the dark in someone's front yard.  Shooting it makes no sense, particularly when it's with the naked kid, particularly when they just have fucking tasers.  Who shoots an animal that size with a taser?  Normal people would assume it's a dog and belongs to said naked sword-wielding kid, who by the way, as far as I can tell, is still in the yard of the safe house.  What the hell?

Anyway, for plot reasons, Henry is shot by the police and Jamey teleports them away.

They teleport to Merlin's Cave, where they meet Space Loki.  I am in physical pain even thinking about this shit.  Dude, Loki is not the good guy.  For a pagan, Rochelle, you've got your lore all wrong.  He says King Arthur is a real thing.  My brain is bleeding out of my fucking ears.  Neil Gaiman you are not.

Space Loki spews bullshit Rochelle thinks is profound, tells them they key is "within" and that they needed to go on the journey before they could discover it "at home".  Rochelle, learn your lore and pick a fucking different god if you want one to be wise and profound.  Not the fucking Norse god of mischief.  Pointless nonsense.

I am willing to bet the key is their peen and the keyhole is a bleached butthole.  Just my interpretation of the "within" and "at home" bit.

The demons dropped Charley's tortured, mangled corpse onto the witch's doorstep.  Their clever plan is to bring it back to the apartment, which the Watchers have already trashed, and leave it there.  You do know the police will know he wasn't killed there?  You do know your prints and DNA will be all over that apartment because you stayed there for a night?  It's almost like Rochelle's world works only in ways that work for the main characters and are convenient to the plot.  Anything inconvenient is just covered up by "it's magic" and left at that.  Cheap and without any imagination or thought.

Rochelle, have you ever, even once, at least watched Law & Order?  You know it doesn't work like that.

So now Ella goes back to thinking it's bad that the demons were seen.  It's so inconsistent I wonder if it's even worth pointing out any more.  Trying to cover up this shit with the phrase:  "Preventing disclosure was no longer quite so important."  (154)  It's ceased to be important to you a while ago, moron.

More than likely, Warren Rochelle never reread his own book, wrote half of it, got bored, stopped for six months, then scribbled down the rest and sent it off to a somewhat lazy editor.

Inconsistency is by and large my biggest problem with this book.  On page 155, the author forgets which character is speaking and says simultaneously, in the same speaking quotation that "Charley was my best friend" and "if you'd been a second sooner Jumping".  I was under the impression that Jamey was the one who could do that, but for all I know, in this book's universe, 2+2= purple because how many pancakes can you line up across the crosswalk.

The character expresses a concern that Henry, who was a fucking werewolf at the time, was tasered.  Yes, people can die from being tasered (and do), but the numbers are relatively low.  So, no, I doubt a fucking werewolf is going to be killed by a taser.

My interpretation of events thus far:  In their hallucinating, they start screaming and attacking the air, frightening some poor woman, who tasers Henry and they run away.

This sentence coupled with the rest of the page is so confusing:  "He reached over and wiggled Jamey's left foot back and forth , then starting rubbing his leg, slipping his hand under his jeans."  (155)

Ignoring the poor grammar, nothing on the rest of the page implies (except for him saying he's stroking Jamey's leg) any kind of sexy times or that Jamey even acknowledges that Henry stuck his hand down his pants.  Or was it Jamey doing that?  I have no fucking idea.

Rochelle leans on this "smell his desire", "voice thick with desire", or my personal favorite "inside a thick cloud of desire" like a crutch.  Use a different phrase once in a while.  Or, better yet, tell me that his voice got low and husky and I can tell he's horny, okay?  Something--anything?

"... inside a thick cloud of desire, their erections rubbing against each other, as they kissed mouths--"

Redundant.  People typically kiss mouths.  If they're kissing elsewhere, mention it, but generally when I read the phrase" they kissed" I don't assume they kissed one another's elbows.

"--licked nipples, skin, skin, and--"

Yes, "skin" is in their twice just like that.

"--wet mouths finding and enveloping hard cocks.  Henry felt like he had been dying of thirst and not known it, but now, he could drink all he wanted and it was Jamey he wanted to drink.  Henry drank."

An accurate representation of my dehydrated pussy.

Hate to tell you this, Henry, but semen tends to be salty.  I don't recommend it for hydration.  Also, as an added bonus, you don't drink "all you wanted" when you're dying of thirst, according to WebMD, so take it with a grain of semen salt.

The inconsistency continues!  Jamey tells Henry that when he talked to his mumsy last, he told her he loved Henry, then in Henry's narrative it says that Henry is Jamey's dirty little secret.  What the fuck?  How is this a secret?

The best insults in Ella's narrative are "fools" like a children's anime poorly translated into English.  Baka!

She uses the church as a base of her operations, which I think is supposed to be symbolic, this being a book written by and marketed to pagans.  Am I the only one who is dimly amused that the pagans chose to put their safe house right next door to a church?  In Virginia?  Did the church people know?  I like to think that they did and occasionally picketed.

The safe house in Richmond they are at once again is under attack.  Jamey needs to recharge like a phone battery that he's scared of and can't teleport them so they go through secret underground tunnels into a nearby park.  Behind them, the house explodes/collapses/whatever it's not specific.  Melloy whines about how she left her phone in the fucking house.  This is 2009.  Your little Blackberry is about to obsolete anyway and it's not like a smartphone where the little guy is basically your entire existence in a handheld device.

Why does Jamey need to close his eyes every time he teleports?  I assume it has something to do with his wee brain trying to concentrate, but it never says.

Finally on to Chapter Sideways Infinity

Setting up the church as their mission base was a waste of time because it just collapsed with the safe house anyway.  Ella wonders if the edicts about them not being seen are still important and that her primary goal is to keep the boys away from each other, which frankly, seems counter-intuitive.  What would be the point in preventing magic being let loose on the world if she just intends to expose herself and all the demons anyway?

New angle:  She's actually the good guy.  Why not?  Plenty of "good guys" in fiction torture and kill people and it looks to me like she's trying to prevent what could be a catastrophe.  Don't tell me magic being real and everyone knowing witches exist wouldn't lead to massive witch burnings and a magical creatures registry/internment camp.  Again, this would be more interesting than this book.

Our possible villains find themselves in the only other place Jamey's limited world experience could take them to:  A library at his old college.  He admires Henry's hairy ears for a bit instead of focusing on, I don't know, surviving.

Well, it gets one thing right:  Henry reminisces that his high school counselor told him he's not college material, though hits on the wrong subjects.  She said he barely passed his English classes, but the real reason he isn't college material is because of an outstanding fear of technology and an infantile emotional maturity.  He also doesn't know what a toga is (168).

On the way out of the library, they get attacked by a group of werewolves and abducted.  The werewolves even had burlap sacks to throw over their head--no idea where you acquire those these days.

Henry wakes up to find he has been kidnapped and is in the paws hands of a group of werewolves.  He, for some reason, seems to think that clothing would help with Watchers and laments being naked.  They also bound his wrists and ankles but this is a pointless gesture as they just immediately untie him once he's conscious anyway, which is pointless because they go on to explain why they need to kill them.  Why would you do that?  Why bother?  I can understand keeping them alive this long if they have questions, but they don't ask anything.  They just untie him, spoon feed him a bunch of backstory, then explain that he's a danger to them and they need to kill him.  So why bother untying him?

(The answer is:  Plot device.)

Henry also gains the ability to see the wind on page 170.  He says it's "black", so I guess that defeats the "god is like the wind" argument, aside from the wind being measurable and has a scientific explanation for its existence and so forth.

It cuts back to Ella, who orders her troops to go to sleep.  Apparently, she has to designate each individual spot to each individual critter because they wouldn't sleep or find places to sleep without her specific instruction.

Her lieutenant apparently remembers her full human name, which Ella considers to be a bad sign, which is a bit hypocritical considering that she still even thinks of herself as hers and remembers her husband and children somewhat frequently.

They go on to say that a Watcher's children will be a Watcher, at least with enough probability that "one or two" will "awaken".  Werewolves and fae (they call them godlings, which is a stupid word) are the same.  The obvious problem with this is breeding.  If the supernatural has existed as long as humans and is actively breeding with them and the Watchers reincarnate/are immortal, the Watchers would, over time, outnumber the humans, similar to how "old recycled souls" should outnumber "new souls".  Makes no fucking sense.  In the words of Shelly Segal:  "Almost all who've ever lived have already died".

More attempts to sound sciencey:

"I know the old gods made us, a genetic code hidden in the human genome, and in that code is our task..." (172)

I like how it kills any aspect of science in the same fucking sentence, but it gets better.

"To do so is a biological necessity.  But then the old gods made us with minds, with intelligence.  Watchers think."

Omg--are they doing it?  Is this going to become the free will argument?  Do we get a pagan version of "nothing happens that isn't Yahweh's will"?

Rather than get into philosophical debate, which I think would be too taxing for Rochelle's writing talent, Ella snaps the other one's neck.  Awesome.  What was the point here?  Does it do anything?  I get that it's supposed to be "oo--look how evil she is" but won't she just reincarnate anyway, so isn't this just putting the other one in time out for a while?

It cuts back to the boys.  Henry can smell the little demon critters coming for them, then the "black wind" starts up and it tears "the words from the Speaker's mouth, ripping them into letters and sounds, swallowing them" (173).  I'm confused--aren't spoken words just sounds that we attribute meaning to for the sake of communication?

Henry runs to Jamey and unties his wrists and feet.  Ever tried untying wet rope quickly?  This is one of the most unbelievable parts in the entire book.  I keep saying that and I plan to continue.  This book is repetitive so it calls for repetitive commentary.

They teleport to Charley's old apartment for the sole purpose of seeing all the damage done.  For some reason, they can see Charley's car from the apartment and it's also been wrecked like a toddler throwing a tantrum.  Why Henry intuitively knows which car is Charley's is beyond me.  It's almost like Rochelle doesn't know how apartments work.  For example, destroying someone's apartment creates a great deal of noise, none of which will go unnoticed.  Someone would call the police, for domestic violence if for no other reason, because someone will hear it--that's the nature of an apartment.  If nothing else, Roommate Al would have called the police.  The car would be towed if it were that level of mess too--and remember, this happened days ago.  This is the most unrealistic thing ever--ask anyone who has ever lived in an apartment complex how delighted the management is to tow your car.

Jamey herein uses the phrase "while I recharge".  Did I mention how technophobic they both are?  Only about a dozen times?  Why is it believable that he would use such a tech-friendly phrase?  It's just so out of place.

Anyway, conveniently, they didn't smash the phone and a message is on the machine (did we still have those in 2009?  Would a college student have even had one?).

Jamey's mumsy is in the hospital and Jamey does the logical thing and picks up the phone and dials home/the nearest hospital to his home.  Obvious trap is obvious.

Just kidding.  He teleports right into the hospital.

But, hey, I'm on Chapter Fellowship of the Ring now.

They teleport back to the library to crash the night on the couch after a minor lover's spat.  We get a mild description of their dreams, because that's important for some stupid reason, then they wake up.  I'm getting real fucking sick of all of the "they went to sleep/dreamed/wake up nonsense".

Jamey finds a newspaper that says the fire from a bit ago had "no known origin".  I think in real life, we'd claim that was arson.

They rob food from a 7-Eleven via teleportation and then get ready to teleport again.

Apparently, in this world two days of stubble makes a beard.  For the guys who have to grow out their beards for weeks, this is a bit of a fuck you, isn't it?

This entire part is solely for drama.  Just so we can have Henry feel bad for Jamey's family being bigoted and making Jamey choose between his family and Henry.  Prayer SWAT Team arrives (wish I was being funny--they are a bunch of men in black suits carrying Bibles headed by a pastor) and hold Jamey.  They attempt an exorcism to get rid of "teh gayes".  They recite Bible verses and whatever and for some reason, no one can manage to shut the door in Henry's face.  Southern hospitality?

Are prayer SWAT teams a thing?

I am also apart from this definition of SWAT.

Another issue here is that Rochelle doesn't actually understand the fundie Christian worldview that "homosexuality is a sin" and strawmans their argument.  This irritates me because it's not difficult to actually find their arguments on the internet, but instead the author just regurgitates trash.  If you're going to have two characters argue about it, at least don't strawman one argument.  I'm on your side, Rochelle, but it could not be more clear to me that you've only heard people on your side regurgitate the other's opinions.  The dialogue is terrible is what I'm saying.

Henry makes almost no effort at all to save Jamey from the Spiritual Warfare Attack Team beyond some angry crying and whining, then he hangs his head and leaves after the father gives him back the pentacle, which I guess he ripped from his son's neck in subtext.

I know some evangelical Christians who believe in "pray the gay away" and I can say with absolute surety, you ain't gettin' your star necklace back, boy.  They'd put it in the garbage or something along those lines.  They like them a good book burnin' and pagan symbols would be on the list, but we need it for a plot point I bet.

This has been the best chapter so far, because it has been the shortest.

Chapter Three Extra Dwarfs.

There are several pages of drivel about Henry thinking.  Boring shit.

Then I get this:  It's only five of eight in the morning?  (193)

I have no idea what that means.  Typo?  5 or 8?  Five past eight?  5:08?

The author needs to stop repeating the same shit over and over.  I don't mean the issues of regurgitating the same ideas over and over or even the sleep/dream/wake thing--those are separate problems.  This garbage:  "... and watch them, wishing, wishing, wanting." (194)  It happens so often--why do you need to repeat words so much?  It doesn't add anything to the story!

The whining really goes on and on.  It's just the same shit over and over.  "I don't know what to do--waaaah" could sum up the five pages of bitching really well.  Protip:  If it adds nothing, you don't need it.

Henry wanders into a library and the witches find him via the tracking device magic pentacle after he has stress-morphed into wolf form. 

Why do clothes always shred in werewolf novels?  I can understand a shirt shredding depending on the quality and fit of the shirt, but denim is actually a pretty tough fabric, generally about 9-14 oz per square yard.  A 10 oz pair of jeans can withstand a minimum of 66 pounds of force and upwards to over 177, depending entirely on the weight of the denim and which direction the stress was in.  The stress coming from all sides (warp and weft) would be a fair consideration, but I'm still not totally convinced that all clothes would shred to pieces.  Have you ever noticed how much your cheap T-shirt will stretch?  Wonders of modern textiles (elastic:  Great stuff).  I'd like to point out that at an earlier place in the book, it clearly states that the clothes Henry is wearing are too big as well--at least twice.

 Henry decides to give up, following the classic book formula of a series of ups and downs.

Chapter eleventy-first-minus one digit.

Switch perspective--Jamey POV.  We enter the scene.  Is it a classic exorcism, tied to the bed by ropes of virtue, gagged with gym socks of love?  Nothing nearly so kinky.  I'm disappointed.

They don't... do anything.  They just tell Jamey to pray and then lock him in his room.  Complete wasted opportunity.  A few paragraphs of faith healing and speaking in tongues nonsense, snake handling, juba, preaching, a gospel choir, something would be more interesting than "you're bad--go to your room".  I mean, once again, I have to say--I had a crazy evengalist/pentacostal mother who tried to anoint my door with oil and wanted to do an exorcism on me because I was wearing makeup (don't ask) and this is it?  I've had worse shit happen in real life, Rochelle (Satan has his claws in your shoulders, Selana!).  Are you just this unimaginative?  You couldn't look up real-life stories on what kids go through?

Rochelle continues on with my theory that the author doesn't really understand religious fundamentalism.  Jamey describes his room as "untouched"  This is laughable because the first thing his parents would have done is tear apart his room, wondering if he had found anything that "ruined him"--notebooks, diaries, books, etc.  Also, if they were really as religious as the book continues to claim, I guarantee they wouldn't have allowed him to have a ceramic dragon statuette.  Why do I say so?  Because you're reading something from someone who had to smuggle books home at the bottom of their backpack/in their shirt and hide in their closet to read fantasy novels because unicorns are satanic and Lucifer is called a "dragon".

Rochelle seems to think that a religious family would allow a lock on their teenage son's door (that locks from the inside that he has control over).  Ha, no.  You're lucky if they don't insist the door has to be open at all times and forget knocking.  I mean, seriously, they're so religious that computers come from Satan, but locks on doors and ceramic dragons are okay?

I am super disappointed--was expecting some Kidnapped for Christ level shit, but that was clearly asking for too much.  What happens next is really tame:

After a while, they come inside, tape posters with anti-gay slogans to the walls (gee, remember that time you changed your entire life because of a poster?  Me neither) and finally start the religious prayers.  This continues all day and Rochelle gives us a nice list of food he eats (two fucking lists), because this is important for some reason, as well as how many times he was allowed to go to the bathroom.  What they neglected to mention was if the door had to be open or if someone was in the bathroom with him, or if he was on a timer.  You never know--could be masturbating and masturbation is a sin.  If you're male anyway--the Bible doesn't say jack fucking shit about female masturbation, beyond "women are icky".

Jamey gives in and repents--the weak-willed little piskie.  You broke like brittle arthritic hips in a bad fall and they did almost nothing to you.  No sleep deprivation and they even let him eat, didn't force him to stand--this is really tame shit compared to other people's real life stories.  What the fuck, dude?

And apparently the bear claw, banana, and orange juice he stole from the grocery store combined with the two apples, another banana, two orange juices, and two sandwiches eaten in the day aren't enough to fill his little tummy (and you expect us to believe you're a college student--ha!) and he goes to bed hungry.  Spoiled little shit.

In the morning, we get another list for what his mother delivers to him for breakfast.

Jamey has some more internal battles against bigoted brainwashing that makes no real sense.  The rest of the book has convinced me, through his actions, that he and Henry don't really believe in the Christian concept of deity.  It therefore makes no fucking sense for this to cause him so much turmoil.  Again, Rochelle, if you want your characters to be religious during important plot points, make them religious the rest of the time as well.

Another convenient plot development:  The witches tell them that for Jamey's powers to work, he needs to touch Henry, because Henry is apparently a familiar.  I really hate this convenient "I don't know how Henry can figure this out on his own so I'm just going to have the witches tell him everything" bull shit.  Lazy writer.

Chapter Dozen

Jamey prepares for his upcoming baptism in his church by stripping down to his tighty-whities and a white robe.

Meanwhile, Henry wakes up from another dream we need described and is sent to the church to rescue Jamey.

Ella shows up and summons a "quick storm" that for some reason "takes more of her energy".  It seems to me that she could have summoned a less taxing one that night before and waited on it, but, y'know, plot.

Henry suddenly gains the ability to smell a person's sexual orientation on page 216.  Why am I not surprised?

Henry sneaks up to the pulpit during the prayers and repenting.  Jamey gets into the baptismal pool (these are often a hot tub, fyi) and then the stained glass breaks and demons fly in.

Rochelle, it's the Catholics who have stained glass windows.

Some people die, run around screaming, and whatnot. Henry throws the sword to Jamey and he catches it while he's in the water.  I think it's supposed to be some kind of magic thing.

Henry changes into a wolf and goes to Jamey, then Jamey... flies through the broken glass dome that used to be the ceiling while holding wolf-Henry and his sword.

Close enough.

Jamey takes him somewhere safe that the Watchers will never think to look for him to his fucking childhood bedroom.  You know, the one with the anti-gay slogans taped to the walls.

Apparently, the "key" they were looking for is their penises and the "locks" they need to find are their buttholes.  

I have never been so displeased to be right.

So they have sex, because before all they were doing is oral sex and everyone knows that isn't "real" sex, and that's why all lesbians are virgins.  It only counts if its a penis.

Apparently, back in the day, Jamey kept condoms and lube in his desk.  Again, Rochelle, his parents would have found it.  Even so, it's been months since he was even living there; at the very least, his younger siblings would have gone through it then gasped in horror and showed their parents what they had found like good little Christian children.  So in addition to knowing little about Christians, churches, you also know nothing about younger siblings.  Nice.

When they orgasm, all the Watchers cry out in pain because they can feel the lock turning.

Yes, this is happening.

Ella walks into the house.  It's supposed to be really dramatic and "maybe she'll kill them before they orgasm again" but Rochelle already gives away that they live through the encounter by telling the reader something that Jamey tells Henry some time in the future.

Fortunately, however, they both orgasm just in time for Jamey's mom to open the door.  This is hilarious, but Rochelle downplays this.

Then Ella comes in.  Mumsy screams and throws stuff at her.  Melloy shows up right behind her, but the "lock" opens--kek--and Ella crumbles into a smokey reddish ash.

Like this but with less imagination.

I am really fucking sick of Melloy just showing up and knowing everything they need to know.  It's such a cheap way of communicating the author's ideas and frankly, suspiciously looks like a self-insertion.

For some reason we need three more lists of food (the same foods listed in the same paragraph twice by the way) during meaningless exposition about how Jamey never goes into his parents' room but feels he has to talk to his Mama so he follows her in (after putting on clothes).

His mother laying into him about him being an "abomination" feels a bit more organic than the lines spouted earlier, but its written in such a way as that I must assume that both characters are speaking without any voice inflection or emotion.  After a few lines are exchanged, Rochelle informs us that his mother is drenched in grief like those condoms are drenched in cum and possibly some shit, because we all know they didn't clean themselves out beforehand.  Mama Jamey banishes Jamey from the house and disowns him.

They leave.  Jamey takes his cat--good for him.

Chapter Unlucky

There are a few lines of utterly pointless dialogue and bits of prose that would lose absolutely nothing if cut, then they go into the new safehouse and have tea and cookies, as ya do.

Scratch that--the entire tea and cookies section could be cut and we would lose absolutely nothing from the story.

In fact, the only thing worth keeping in this chapter is the three of them sitting down to breakfast (which is listed) and turning on the TV to listen to President Bush explain that magic has returned, then whatever his wife's name is explains that she's a witch and so are their kids.

Chapter Pimples and Masturbation

Yule/Christmas party.  There's some prose about the "magical fallout" which could have been interesting--more interesting than the book so far anyway.  Jamey does some whining about how his parents excommunicated him and he keeps calling home trying to make nice-nice.  Cute thought, but, kid--the only leverage you have is yourself.  Tell them to fuck off and if they want a relationship with you, they'll have to come around.  If not, you're better off without that garbage in your life.  Go back to college.

The party sounds lively--seriously, I harp on this a lot, but pagans themselves are pretty cool.  They brew their own alcohol (wine, beer, absinthe, etc) and are really crafty (heh) too.  And apparently dress up as warriors and planets for a holiday party.

Fuck, half of this book is just pointless lists.  Rochelle actually gives a fucking detailed list about the gifts they give each other for the fucking holiday.

And we need another list of what their bed smells like.

And what should the book end on but another list of breakfast foods.

Or, from my perspective:  They have both been committed to a home and are on some seeeerious drugs.

For those curious, we never know if it was actually Henry that murdered the people at his job.  They just apparently forget about it, no worries.  Whatever.  He's a murderer.

Since Warren Rochelle likes fucking lists so much, here's a list of things I'd rather eat before I read this book again:  Fried fronded ferns, jellied thumbtacks on lightly toasted Crayola chalk, and scrambled gerbil feet served with a side of salt cubes O'brien and a tall glass of extra pulpy orange juice.

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