Love's Labours Lost by William Shakespeare (illustrated)

Love's Labour's Lost is basically about wordplay; the romance and comedy are weirdly good, but what's great about this is that you read it and just know that Shakespeare is flexing on everyone else's grasp of the English language. Even the characters get confused by his 780° turns of phrase. You desperately need an annotated version of this to understand all the weird layers of puns, references, malapropisms, and metaphors he piles together.

This was my first Shakespeare comedy, and it definitely earned that title. The desperate blundering of the King's courtiers (and how quickly they give up on their vows of celibacy) and the way the Princess and her courtiers fuck around with the men brings up so many laugh-out-loud funny situations. The side characters are also a lot of fun; Costard especially just doesn't seem to understand most of what's being said to him (not that I blame him, see the above flexing on the English language), and it causes all sorts of problems for everyone. The minor characters here provide fun ways to throw additional wrenches into the already problematic courtship of the main characters.

The TL;DR is that this is fantastic as long as you have either hefty footnotes or a god-like understanding of English. Luckily, there are lots of ways to get the former.

Taking characters from classic fairy tales (in this case Red Riding Hood), bringing them to the present day and giving them a paranormal spin is a concept that is rife with potential. I see glimmers of that potential in Red but sometimes the execution gets in the way.

It's worth noting that there is a novelette that precedes this story and that reading that first might better set the stage for what happens in the novel. Some of the events are referenced here but don't receive explanation which can lead to confusion for the reader. It's easy as the author to forget that the reader doesn't have the same knowledge you do, and there's no guarantee that they will start with the first story.

So What's It All About?

Well you have three primary actors in the story, Red who has been stuck in her Vila state for hundreds of years, but resists her abilities because she hates the curse associated with them. Then there's Felan, second in command of the Guard. He finds himself drawn to Red despite the potential problems that creates for him. And finally there's Jac, he wants Red.

These three each represent one of Red Riding Hood, the Wolf and the Hunter, though their personalities and actions may not be quite what you expect from the fairytale (again reading the novelette first may help a lot)

The story follows many of the tropes for paranormal romance in that Red and Felan start off disliking each other, but irresistibly attracted at the same time. It's not an original concept, but the audience for these books likes that trope so fair enough.

Confusion

Reading what I wrote above, you may be asking yourself. What's a Vila? Who are the Guard? And there lies one of the biggest problems with the book as it stands. J. B. Wise clearly has a complex world structure figured out with different powers all locked in a sort of eternal balance. This matters, because things are happening that could upset that balance, and the consequences will likely be bad.

The problem is, I can't really tell you exactly who all these groups are, what they can do and why they might be doing what they are doing. I also can't tell you, in terms of powers, what makes the Guard different from Vila or Trackers.

That confusion is one of the things that stopped me from fully immersing myself in the book. I was always trying to put things together and figure out how they related.

Setting and Description

In the book description, the author says the story is set in the woods of Washington. Now I have never been to Washington so I really can't critique the accuracy of the depiction but with the exception of the one house where Alistair and Felan live (which I can picture) the other locations are a little generic.

This was even more noticeable to me in the flashback scene which was set in Scotland. As someone who spent the first 28 years of his life in Scotland, those scenes felt like "generic historical setting" not Scotland.

I feel that a little more time spent on the settings and getting across what makes those places unique would pay dividends. A missed opportunity here was to utilize scent more when the characters were in wolf form. Their behavior as wolves is carefully described and we get some references to smells, but scent is of particular importance to wolves and using that more would be a great way to emphasise the different form.

Characters

There are quite a few characters introduced in the book and some, naturally, don't get a lot of time. The major characters are fairly well fleshed out however and to act in a way that is distinct to each other.

The relationship between Red and Felan is of course at the core of the story so that gets the most time. As I mentioned earlier it does follow a familiar pattern, but the change in attitude is slow enough to be believable.

There's nothing wildly inconsistent here. Even the withholding of information that various characters do can be argued to be in character for them. There are, however, characters whose motivation could do with a little further explanation

In the end though how much you like this book probably hangs on how much you like Red and Felan. If you connect with their relationship the rest falls into place or gets swept aside.

Did You Like It?

I'm sort of lukewarm on this one. I didn't get caught up in the story the way I would like to have and the cliffhanger at the end of the book didn't hook me for the next one. The threats to both character and setting didn't really connect with me. In the end I feel that there's a better book inside this one waiting to get out. It's possible that potential will be realized in the sequel.

Buy, Sample or Skip?

I'd say grab the sample from Amazon and try it out if the subject sounds interesting. People who are more into the paranormal romance genre will likely be more forgiving of what I perceived as flaws in the story. You'll certainly get a good feel for the pacing and style of the book from that sample.