Ratings: V3, S3, H3
Novels:
Kitty Raises Hell (3/2009)
Kitty’s House of Horrors (1/2010)
Kitty’s Big Trouble (6/2011)
Kitty Steals the Show (7/2012)
Kitty Rocks the House (3/2013)
Short Stories:
"Doctor Kitty Solves All Your Love Problems" (free, on-line origin story, 2001)
"It's Still the Same Old Story" in Down These Strange Streets anthology (10/2011)
Kitty Steals the Show (7/2012)
Kitty Rocks the House (3/2013)
Short Stories:
"Doctor Kitty Solves All Your Love Problems" (free, on-line origin story, 2001)
Kitty's Greatest Hits (collection of short stories about Kitty and her friends) (7/2011)
"Wild Ride" in Running with the Pack (5/2010)
"Kitty Learns the Ropes" in Full Moon City (3/2010)
"Wild Ride" in Running with the Pack (5/2010)
"Kitty Learns the Ropes" in Full Moon City (3/2010)
This post was revised and updated on 9/14/12 to include a review of the tenth novel in the series, Kitty Steals the Show. That review appears first, followed by a very brief overview of the world-building, links to reviews of series-related short stories, and a review of the ninth novel, Kitty’s Big Trouble.
BOOK 10: Kitty Steals the Show
Another story thread follows Cormac/Amelia's attempts to revisit Amelia's former life, including a visit to her childhood home and several meetings with her living relatives. Cormac is definitely a supporting character in this London adventure, appearing in just a few scenes.
In this book, Kitty reunites with several characters we (and she) met back in book 2, Kitty Goes to Washington: Alette, the vampire master of Washington, D.C.; Emma, Alette's former human servant who was Turned in book 2 and who now lives in London in the household of that city's vampire master; and Luis, the sexy were-jaguar with whom Kitty had a steamy one-nighter while she was in Washington. (Kitty's reunion with Luis brings out the jealousy in Ben.) And don't forget Dr. Paul Flemming, the mad scientist who kidnapped Kitty in book 2 and forced her to Change on national television. It wouldn't be an international paranormal conference if the crazies didn't turn up right along with the "normal" people.
As usual, Kitty uses words rather than weapons to make her points, although she does get into a few physical brawls along the way. Kitty's goal is to win as many vamps and lycans to the anti-Roman side as possible in an attempt to weaken Roman's forces and postpone his big take-over plan until the good guys can get themselves organized. The scene in which she meets the European vampire masters at a bloody bacchanal and talks her way under their skin is great—a perfect example of Kitty's use of her talk-show confrontational skills to throw her antagonists off balance.
This book is transitional in nature, a next-step in the inevitable march to total war within the supernatural world. Even though this is a dialogue-heavy tale, the plot moves along quickly, and brief action scenes are sprinkled throughout the story. We meet many new characters who will undoubtedly be players in the coming hostilities, and some of them are quite interesting. For me, this book is better than the last one, with a nice mix of familiar and unfamiliar characters and a plot that promises dangerous future adventures for Kitty and her crew.
WORLD-BUILDING
Kitty is an independent young werewolf who escapes from her abusive pack leader, starts her own pack, and establishes a career as the increasingly well-known host of a late-night radio talk show called The Midnight Hour that has an audience of angst-ridden real-life vampires and lycanthropes as well as a lot of delusional wannabes. Think Ann Landers for supernaturals with a tiny bit of Howard Stern. Supporting characters include her lawyer and (spoiler alert!) eventual husband, Ben O’Farrell, and her friend (and Ben’s cousin), Cormac Bennett, who has spent his life hunting down and killing werewolves and other creatures of the night. Rick, a local vampire leader, also shows up frequently as a supporting character.
As the series opens, the world at large doesn't really believe that vampires and were-creatures exist, but after Carrie is forced to Change on national TV, after being kidnapped in book 2, the secret is out. Kitty's adventures include battles with her original pack leader, serial killers, religious fanatics, crazy scientists, an evil skin walker, and nasty vampires.
SHORT STORIES
Click HERE to read the full text of the very first KITTY story—"Doctor Kitty Solves All Your Love Problems"—which appeared in Weird Tales 324 in the summer of 2001. Click HERE to go to my story-by-story review of Kitty's Greatest Hits, an anthology of short stories all written by Carrie Vaughn in the KITTY NORVILLE world. Click HERE to read my review of the Down These Strange Streets anthology, which includes the short story, "It's Still the Same Old Story" featuring Kitty's friend, Rick, the vampire leader of Denver.
As this book begins, Kitty has been wondering about werewolves in American history, particularly William Tecumseh Sherman, the great Union general from the Civil War, whom she suspects was a werewolf. When she fails in her attempt to have Sherman's body exhumed, Kitty heads off to search for a fabled vampire nest in Kansas that may have wiped out by Wyatt Earp, legendary lawman and (possibly) a vampire hunter. All of Kitty's historical studies are put on hold, however, when she gets a call from Anastasia, her vampire frenemy, asking for help in recovering a powerful object before the evil vampire, Roman (aka Dux Bellorum, aka Gaius Albinus), can get his hands on it. Both Anastasia and Roman have appeared in previous books. In fact, Roman is one of the series' perennial villains—an ancient vampire who has sought worldwide power since before the days of Ancient Rome (from whence he took his name).
Soon, the four intrepid warriors are off to San Francisco: Kitty, Ben, Cormac, and Amelia Parker—the spirit of a Victorian wizard who has possessed Cormac since he was in prison. Anastasia explains that they are searching for the Dragon's Pearl, which has nothing whatever to do with dragons, but is actually a magical object that has the power to exactly replicate any object it touches—imagine an enchanted Xerox copier. Roman wants the Pearl so that he can duplicate the bespelled coins he uses to create and control his vampire minions. Anastasia says that she just wants to keep Roman from getting his hands on the Pearl, but Kitty never really knows when Anastasia is telling the truth. The group spends a great deal of time in some spooky and mystical tunnels under Chinatown, where they are attacked by rogue werewolves and then meet up with some Asian deities who seem to be on their side: Xiwangmu and Sun Wu-kong. By the end of the story, the Pearl has been found, stolen, and found again—sometimes by the good guys and sometimes by the bad ones. As the story resolves itself, Roman makes it quite clear that he is not yet finished with Kitty and her pack. Oh, by the way, Kitty does finally get an answer to her question about General Sherman.
Kitty has come a long way since she began the series as a newly changed werewolf who knew nothing about supernatural life. Here, she muses about her changing perceptions of reality and fantasy: "I'd always drawn lines. Before I became a werewolf, I had assumed—blithely, confidently—that I knew what was real and what wasn't. The world was solid and logical. Then I'd been attacked by an oversized wolf late one night, and a lot of assumptions turned inside out. Werewolves were real, and I'd stepped through a certain kind of looking glass. Then I'd met vampires, were-jaguars, were-tigers, psychics, wizards, ghosts, djinn, fairies. With each encounter I erased the line and drew it a little further out. Like, maybe Bram Stoker's Dracula had been based on a real-live—real undead—vampire. Maybe a lot of those stories had their roots in reality. But that didn't mean that some ultrapowerful guy named Zeus ever turned himself into a swan to try to pick up girls. It didn't mean that when you prayed there was actually someone out there listening. Did it?" (p. 227)
Kitty's Big Trouble is not my favorite KITTY book. The characters spend so much time mucking around in the tunnels and trying to interpret obscure Chinese mythology that I found my interest flagging a bit. My favorite KITTY stories are the early ones, when she was fighting her way up in werewolf society and struggling to make it on her own. Now that she's achieved some power and fame, she's not quite as interesting. And poor Ben, who has never been a macho man, has turned into a real wimp, always on the edge of losing control and never decisively winning his fights. Sometimes I think that Kitty would have been better off with Cormac. That being said, I still love Kitty and her friends, and I will definitely keep reading. Let's hope that KITTY gets back on track in the next books. Click HERE to read chapter 1 of Kitty's Big Trouble free of charge.
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