Review: Bitten

Name: Bitten

Author: Kelley Armstrong

Series: Women of the Otherworld

Recieved: Purchased


Elena Michaels seems like the typically strong and sexy modern woman, She lives with her architect boyfriend, writes for a popular newspaper, and works out at the gym. She's also a werewolf.

Elena has done all she can to assimilate to the human world, but the man whose bite changed her existence forever, and his legacy, continue to haunt her. Thrown into a desperate war for survival that tests her allegiance to a secret clan of werewolves, Elena must recon with who, and what, she is in this passionate, page-turning novel.



                                             

 

Disappointment at it's finest.
After having unsuccesfully gotten through 50 agonizing pages of The Summoning , from Kelley Armstrong's young adult series, I decided to give her Adult series a go since I've been hearing such great things- Plus she was in town for a signing, so it seemed like a win, win situation.
Opened up the book and started reading... Okay I was impressed. It didn't start off completely boggus like The Summoning and I didn't get the urge to kill the main character right off the bat. In fact, the intro was actually... good.
50 pages in... It's slow now, but that's okay. Most books start off slow.
100 pages in... It's getting better. Plot's boring, but Clayton is interesting.
200 pages in.... Why Kelley. why.

In my previous experiences, the content usually ascends in bookish awesomeness- not vice versa. It wasn't until I was about 200 pages in did the story get too interesting to put down.
Don't get me wrong; this is a good book. I was merely disappointed with what I read, as my expectations were sky high going into it. Maybe I need to stop raising the pole so damn high, but it's hard to help when I've read so many great reviews. I'll definitly need to stop reading reviews before I have come to a conclusion about a novel myself. *Sigh* I'll never learn.

Bitten follows Elena, the Only female werewolf in the world, as she returns from Toronto to help her former pack fight a suprise uprising by 'mutts' that don't seem to know their place. Elena only wanted a normal life; until she was bitten. She moved away to try and forget, and found a man that made her feel human again. She denied her old life until duty calls, and she has to face the man that betrayed her in the worst possible way and the pack that expects her loyalty when danger threatens their sanctuary. Elena's desperate need to feel human comes head to head with her inner wolfish desires, as she fights a battle of old, shattered love, instinct, betrayal & realization.

I liked Elena. She's a fierce, fiesty chick that can hold her own against guys twice her size. She's slightly troubled by the past that haunts her and is constantly trying to forget the fact that the man she loved betrayed her and turned her into the monster she now is. Her constant denial of her feelings for Clay ticked me off 99.9999% of the time. I understood her uncertainty with her feelings and her place of belonging,  I mean, who would blame her? Her fiance turned her into a werewolf before they got married.
I liked her attitude and her temper, they suited the situation she has been placed in. The only thing I can really complain about is her constant Love-Hate for Clay, which gets annoying to a certain degree after she fucks him about 5 times and then claims that she doesn't love him & Philip is the guy she wants to be with.
I loved Clay. He was so protective over Elena, that it overrode his asshole-ness most of the time. I respected his cocky attitude, because really, Elena left him no choice. He's a total badass and his  commitment to the Pack, Jeremy & Elena is just so darn cute!
I'm definitly excited to see more of him in the novels to come. 

The plot was an iffy situation for me. Some parts were extremely well developed and executed, while others were boring and poorly written. I do feel that this novel had the potential to be amazing, if it wasn't for the fact that Armstrong played it safe most of the time. I wanted to see Elena go after Clay no matter what Jeremy said. Not sit there and negotiate. I wanted to see Clay act on his own, not follow Jeremy like a lost pup, when his personality was clearly more than that. The story only really let loose near the end, and even the final fight scene was played as safe as a 'fight' could get. I wasn't unhappy with the ending per se, but I do believe that it had the potential to leave a bigger impact.
I've crossed my fingers for the next book in the series... Maybe Armstrong will suprise me.

Happy reading!