Review "Kitty goes to War"

Title: Kitty Goes to War (Kitty Norville, #8)
Author: Carrie Vaughn
Genre: Urban Fantasy
Published: June 29th 2010 by Tor Books (first published June 22nd 2010)


Kitty Norville, werewolf radio call-in show host, gets a call from an old friend at the NIH’s Center for the Study of Paranatural Biology, a friend ...more Kitty Norville, werewolf radio call-in show host, gets a call from an old friend at the NIH’s Center for the Study of Paranatural Biology, a friend with a problem, who doesn’t know where else to turn. Three Army soldiers who have recently returned from the war in Afghanistan are in custody at Ft. Carson in Colorado Springs. They’re also werewolves suffering from post traumatic stress, unable to control their shape-shifting, unable to interact with people. Kitty agrees to see them, curious and wanting to help. Meanwhile, Kitty gets sued for slander after featuring Speedy Mart—a chain of 24-hour convenience stores with a reputation for attracting the supernatural—on her show, and an old friend-and-adversary has just been released from jail.

*This review might contain spoilers!*

The Kitty Norville series was one of the first series I started reading after the Kate Daniels and Mercy Thompson series. I really liked all the previous books in the series so I was really excited about this one.

The book starts a while after the events of the last books, right in the middle of one of Kitty´s radio shows. The story picks up the pace very fast, as the events of one major plots start right then and there. The show is about Speedy Mart and Kitty is collecting evidence for suspicious supernatural activities there. The other plot involving the werewolf soldiers starts soon after.

The good thing about this book is that you get to see Kitty, Ben and Cormac finally together again. As a declared Cormac fan, I was very happy to see him more often in this book. But it´s not the Cormac we know, the one he was before going to jail. Something has changed him, and we have to wait right until the end of the book what exactly is responsible for his change. His return is definetly one of the best things about this book.
Kitty and Ben are once again great together. She still tries to prove that no one, not even totally out of control werewolves are beyond saving and redemption.
Kitty genuinly cares about the soldiers, even though they are not part of her pack.
Ben is as always the steady rock behind her. Regardless of his own opinion or even whether if it´s illegal ir not, he still supports her. Who wouldn´t want to have a boyfriend like that? This book is less focused on their romance which is however a postitive thing, at least for me. All of us who have read the previous books know that they love each other. The two plots in this book are enough as it is, so steamy romance and sex would kind of be out of place.
Still, there was something that was bugging me, I just felt like the events of the last book should have had a greater impact on Kitty. It was mentioned a few times how she felt she was paranoid, but after all the bloodshed and gore of the last book, it should have affected her more than that. But maybe that´s just me.
I really liked the idea behind the werewolf soldiers and the post-traumatic stress disorder and I would have liked to read more about it. It was a good opportunity to show Kitty´s caring nature and character, which makes her in my opinion such a great alpha for her pack.
The ending is kind of bittersweet: both cases are -so to speak- closed and we get to know what´s going on with Cormac. There is no happy end for the wsoldiers, at least not all of them, but I guess it´s better that way. I guess it just shows that there are things in life you can´t get over.
All in all, I had a really tough time writing this review. I liked the characters of this series and the story was good as well: it was fast paced, never dull and the message behind the army werewolf story is definetly important. But that´s just it: I guess I could have been even better. It´s a bit of a shame that I read some of the best books so far this year right before "Kitty Goes to War", because without them, I would have probably liked it even more. As it is, books like "Unholy Magic" are kind of the standart other books ahve to live up to and that´s pretty hard to say the least.

As it is, "Kitty Goes to War" is somewhere between 3.5 and 4 points for me, but considering how much I like this series and the characters, it´s 4 points.