I was really intrigued by the idea of a werewolf who's also an archaeologist. I was hoping for a supernatural Lara Croft but SEVEN KINDS OF HELL's protagonist is more of an everyday girl who just happens to be an archaeologist. It's not necessarily a bad thing but it was a bit different from my expectations.
Zoe Miller has been in hiding her whole life. She's a werewolf but she hides her Beast because her mother has taught her to stay low and avoid her supernatural family, the Fangborn. After Zoe's mother dies and Zoe is getting ready to run again when she gets drawn into an international hunt for Fangborn artifacts. Zoe is thoroughly unqualified for this in some ways but eminently suitable in others, given her undergraduate studies in archaeology and her innate Fangborn abilities. I can't say too much about them without giving away some major plot points but I will say that it's an important quest, the implications of which will likely be felt throughout the series. To Cameron's credit, the stakes are quite high and quite real: not everyone survives the many confrontations between Zoe and her team and the groups that oppose them.
My favourite part of SEVEN KINDS OF HELL is the world building. The Fangborn mythology has some unique takes on some supernatural species. The werewolves are pretty standard but Cameron's vampires are more like snakes, which is quite interesting, especially since these vampires have multiple physical forms. These vampires still have the ability to get into people's minds but they thrive in sunlight. It's a really neat spin and I'm curious to see how Cameron will depict other supernatural groups.
The weakest part of the book for me is the character development (or lack thereof, in some cases). I liked the characters in the book but I didn't really connect with them, not even Zoe. Cameron introduces some potentially great characters in SEVEN KINDS OF HELL but we don't get to know any of them very well, perhaps because there are so many of them. I do like a lot of them: Danny and Sean were particularly endearing, and I was very curious about Adam Nichols. But, on the whole, I felt like a lot of the characters were fairly one-dimensional.
Despite this issue, I'm going to try the next book in the series. I'm hoping that PACK OF STRAYS will give us some more character development, so that I can really get into the Fangborn series. 
Sounds like a good book especially about the world building. Just added this to by TBR list. Thanks for sharing your review!
ReplyDeleteI'll have to add this one to my TBR. It sounds really good. Thanks for the review.
ReplyDeleteNice review Jenn, thank you. I have this on my wishlist, and I still want to read it.
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