Let me start out by saying that Predator & Prey Book 3: Werewolf, was one of two books I received from rpg.net for review from the Hunter line. With one exception, everything else you've seen me write up about Hunter was paid for out of my own pocket. With that in mind, you may think I might be more lenient in my judgement of this book, since none of my hard-earned cash went into its purchase. Luckily for you, I'm an impartial sort, so I won't hesitate to explain why this book is unworthy of your purchase.
To start with, some of you were probably offended by my review of the Hunter Survival Guide, where I commented on White Wolf's habit of having politically correct characters, with "politically correct" meaning the characters are either minorities/oppressed/engage in behavior not accepted by the public, but come across as falling into one of those three categories because White Wolf thought it might increase sales and promote the opinion that their company is progressive and open-minded, rather than because it makes for a cool character. Well, the Hunter star of this book, a girl named Kaitlin, is the perfect example of what I mean by White Wolf's take on politically correct. Kaitlin is 23, a recovering alcoholic, a pot head, a former Christian/fundamentalist Muslin, Scientoligist, Democratic Party member, Republican Party member/rap music fan who is also of mixed racial heritage, though that's mentioned only once; the rest of the time she only refers to herself as black, usually to express surprise no one is oppressing her because she is black or to voice the thought that people are acting oddly because she's black in a white community (at least I think it's a predominantly-white community; only a handful of people are encountered in this book, and only three are identified as being white). After going through the imbuing she seems to have done nothing more than observe monsters, until some normal humans gang raped her, enforcing the old White Wolf of cliche of "which is the true monster-a normal human or a supernatural entity?" at which points she leaves her home city and goes off into a an isolated community. Fortunately she has a trust fund kick in so she can live in isolation and mope is self-pity without having to work.
As you might have guessed, I don't like Kaitlin, finding her to not exactly jibe with the idea of Hunters being real people with real lives.
The other main character of this book is Black Rindle, a metis Garou whose parents belong to the same Sept, of which he is a peripheral member. Strangely, for being a werewolf raised away from human society for the most part, Rindle comes off as a far more realistic character than Kaitlin. Of course his being an outcast of his society and Kaitlin's separation from normal society allows a bond to build between them. There are other characters in the book, but are so two-dimensional that I'm having trouble remembering any of their names at this moment. That's a good thing in my opinion, because I'm hoping that means that shortly after I finish writing this review my brain will erase all memory of this book from my mind, so the hurting will stop.
The first major flaw of this book is that it suffers what my old Call of Cthulhu gaming group used to call "Wainescoating-ism." Wainescoating-ism sprung up from a series of Call of Cthulhu scenario books we played through, where the authors would go on and on about minor details, such as Wainescoating and furnishings in a room, include details about characters that had no effect on game play, or used multiple paragraphs to describe things that could be summed up in a single sentence. My gaming group began to use the term to describe any book where it seemed like the author was paid by the word, and had thrown in anything and everything he could into his work so that his paycheck would be bigger. Predator & Prey: Werewolf suffers from the last of the flaws listed, with many pages used to describe character feelings and actions that each, at most, should have taken only two sentences to describe. This flaw is magnified by the fact that the author seemed to have problems with the concept that this is a piece of serial fiction, and not budgeted his page allotment accordingly.
This is book three in a six book series. All other series fiction I have read (with one exception) in my life has been written that while the story progresses from book to book, each book has problems and resolutions unique to it, so the reader can enjoy the book on its own even if the other books in the series are not available to read. Such is not the case with P&P: Werewolf. There are two main plotlines, that of Black Rindle's place in his sept, and the mysterious goings-on at a farm and at the place Kaitlin works. Black Rindle's storyline is resolved, though at the end the departure of two of the characters who had opposed him feels like an episode of the old G.I. Joe cartoon; I was just waiting for one of the Garou pair to throw up his fist and yell "this isn't the end! COOOBRAAA!" The second storyline is totally left hanging until the next book in the series, Predator & Prey: Jury. That might not be a problem, however, the back cover of the book says that the story in this book is continued in Predator & Prey: Mage, the FIFTH book in the series, and the one after P&P: Jury. So if someone actually likes this book and trusts the back cover, they're not going to find out how the story ends.
What make it even worse is that the last 28 (29, if you count a blank page separating it from the main novel story) are excerpts of fiction from Werewolf novels, and this is followed by some ad copy for other WOD novels. The 28 pages piss me off for three reasons. First, the pages have an introduction by Stewart Wieck, editor of the Werewolf line novels, who comments that all the Werewolf novels are interconnected, but can be enjoyed individually as well. That's great, Stewart, but do you think you could have had this P&P novel be the same way? Second, these pages could have been devoted to the main story, perhaps making it more enjoyable, or at least possess better closure. Finally, one of the excerpts is written by the author of the P&P: Werewolf novel, and it is head and shoulders above the quality of writing that is found in P&P: Werewolf. No Waynescoatingism, characters that are interesting and believable; how the hell can an 11-page preview contain more quality than the novel it is contained in, when both are written by the same author? What, is he just doing the P&P novels for some quick cash, and doesn't care what the quality of them is like?
Oh, I almost forgot one of the worst things in this book, something others who'd read this book before me warned me about, and the main reason I had never purchased this book. At one point in the book Black Rindle takes Hunter Kaitlin into the Umbra with him. The problem with this is that according to the Hunter Storyteller's Companion, Hunters are NEVER, EVER ABLE to go into the Umbra or other spiritual planes, willingly or not. The Messengers have grounded the Hunters into the material world, and so cannot exit it. Some might argue what is the harm in this, and to them I reply "Hey, if turnabout is fair play, then all Hunter Edges should now extend into the Umbra and spiritual worlds." I should be able to use Ward and have it extend into the Umbra, I should be able to swing my Cleave blade randomly, and anything occupying the corresponding space in the Umbra should take damage, and so on and so forth. To me, this was a real disrespect to the source material, made more offending by the fact that the author seems to gone to great pains to stay true to the Werewolf rule system.
I cannot recommend it for purchase to anyone. Let this one rot on the shelves.
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