Upstream Reviews - Pack Dynamics (Book 1) by Julie Frost

From the review by Declan Finn:

Before our story begins, Private Investigator Ben Lockwood was an Army Ranger, held POW in Afghanistan for seven months, being tortured in new and creative ways that I wonder if the cave dwellers were smart enough to ever actually use. Now that he’s back stateside, he works a desk job at the PI firm owned by his mother’s girlfriend. It’s a nice boring desk job. His latest case is a nice boring investigation into possible pharmaceutical espionage. So why does page one see Ben being kidnapped and tortured for information on the case? Good question.

Ben’s client is Alex Jarrett, a CEO of Big Pharma that specializes in nanotechnology medications and treatments. But, he will not deal with the supernatural, so vampires and werewolves are just plain out of luck. This includes his nearest competitor, a werewolf married to a vampire, who may be dying—for good. Yes, we have science fiction medical technology, werewolves and vampires. For the record, no, I haven’t spoiled anything. This doesn’t even get us to page 50 of a nearly 300 page novel. This boils down to being an urban fantasy medical thriller, now with more gunfire. And kidnappings. And torture. Seriously, this feels like if Jim Butcher had a Harry Dresden book set in a hospital, yet the building was still standing when it was all over, and not on fire.

Read the full review at https://upstreamreviews.substack.com/p/bookreview-pack-dynamics-by-julie.

From the review by Vanessa Landry:

In the first five pages, our mostly main character, Ben Lockwood, recent veteran turned PI, gets kidnapped, shot and tortured after taking an industrial espionage case. Who knew the world of biologics could be so vicious? But when you are dealing with the ramifications of werewolves vampires and other denizens of the night being available for genetic manipulation, all bets are off. Especially when the lives of loved ones are at stake. This is not the sort of book where you have to wonder who the bad guy is. We see this in the first five minutes of reading. But it is the kind of book where you wonder what the next twist is going to be. It is a wild ride— as you’d expect with werewolves.

After months of being a POW in Afghanistan, Army Ranger Ben Lockwood is now a Private Investigator, and just wants a safe, boring life. With his boss (his girlfriend’s mother) on vacation, he takes an “easy” case of pharmaceutical espionage. In short order, he’s caught in the crossfire of werewolf hunting to cure his dying vampire wife, a mad scientist, and himself. Ben’s blood is the key to the vampire's recovery, and the werewolf wants his blood, one way or another. This is the beginning of a series, and reads something like an episode of Leverage with severely weakened plot armor. This is the kind of book that grabs you by the throat and keeps shaking until the very end.

Read the full review at https://upstreamreviews.substack.com/p/pack-dynamics.

You can find this book with links to purchase it at: https://spotlightonindie.com/books/pack-dynamics