I inhaled the Night Huntress series back in the summer of 2017, working my way through the seven books of the initial series as well as a bunch of spin-offs. I was absolutely entranced by the world Jeaniene Frost created and it quickly became one of my favorite paranormal romance stories. One of the things I really liked about the books was that (for the most part) the stories are told solely from the heroine’s first-person point of view. But of course I (and pretty much everyone else who’s read the book) have always wanted a peek at inside the hero’s head, especially for pivotal events. So I was greatly amused by the author posting the first bits of Bone’s POV on her blog, and pleasantly surprised when she announced that she’d be publishing a whole book. But would reading the book from Bones’ viewpoint be interesting enough to outweigh the fact that I’d quite literally read it before?
“She was a brash, brave, foul-mouthed, murdering drunk, and God help him, he hadn’t found anyone this enticing in centuries.”
The short answer? Yes, for the most part, it works out. The insta-love between Bones and Cat is, well, still insta-lovey, but it at least explains a little better what about Cat first caught his eye. It also sets the stage for some some epic pining (along with some very sweet – and confused – musings about what makes her so special). I always got the sense that Bones had a very good understanding of what Cat was going through, and this book makes it clear that frankly he had a much better understanding of Cat herself than she did for quite a while. Experiencing everything Cat went through from her perspective was heartbreaking, but in some ways experiencing it through Bones’ is equally jarring. He cares so much for her and treasures her uniqueness, but for her it’s only a source of shame. That’s not to say it’s all endless pining. Not surprisingly, he’s also quite funny, especially when he’s feeling exceedingly murderous about Cat’s mom.
The book isn’t a complete copy-and-paste retelling. There are extra scenes, from the expected “what the heck was Bones doing when he was off-page?” to a few new scenes between Bones and Cat. It was charming to see how Bones reacted to figuring out he was in insta-love with Cat (he calls Charles!) and the scenes between him and Ian were hilarious as well. It also fixes some of the, uh, late nought UF language that didn’t age particularly well.
“Weakness was fleeting. Vengeance was forever.”
Overall, finishing this book up did make me want to jump into a massive series reread. I wouldn’t recommend this as a good entry-point to the series, but rather the cherry on top to Cat’s finished (for now?) series. Highly recommended for any Cat & Bones fan!
I received an advance review copy of this book from NetGalley. This does not affect my opinion of the book or the content of my review.
