Book & Audio Review: Wolf Who Rules by Wen Spencer

Wolf Who Rules
Author: Wen Spencer
Narrator: Tana Eby
Series: Elfhome (Book 2)
Publication: Baen Books; 1st edition (April 1, 2006); Audible Studios (December 12, 2014)
Length: 366 p.; 13 hours and 10 minutes

Description: Tinker: just a quick-witted girl from Pittsburgh - who happens to be responsible for depositing high elves and her hometown humans into a melting pot of magic. Now the draconian oni seek to destroy the elves by breeding human git to do their evil bidding. But half-breeds who are half-human may not be the slaves the oni imagined. The revolt is on! Its leader A certain newly-minted elven princess from Pittsburgh, PA, by the name of Tinker.

My Thoughts: This story is a direct sequel to TINKER. It begins with a Prologue that catches up the reader on the main events in TINKER through the vehicle of Windwolf's participation in a ceremony of memory. Then the action begins...

Pittsburgh is stranded on Elfhome along with its 60,000 citizens who are mostly human but also include tengu and oni and half-oni. Windwolf and the Wind Clan need to root out the oni who are also immortal, breed like rabbits, and want to conquer Elfhome. It is too big a task and requires Windwolf to call in help from other clans. But this comes at a cost: the Stone Clan sees this as a weakness in Wind Clan and wants to institute a land grab and even assassinate Windwolf and Tinker and the Queen's representative also wants to gain a greater control in the Westernlands.

While Windwolf plays politics, Tinker is busy trying to clean up the mess left behind when she destroyed the interdimensional gate. Besides stranding Pittsburgh on Elfhome, it also left the ghost lands - a weird spatial discontinuity which seems to contain fractured pieces of various dimensions all jumbled together.

Tinker is also being plagued by dreams that seem to contain prophesy which are waking her screaming in the night and leaving her sleep deprived during the day. The dreams indicate that there is something she still needs to do to make things right. They contain elements from the Wizard of Oz which is odd because Tinker had not seen that movie. In it, she is the Scarecrow and is the one with the answers which she finds increasingly frustrating.

While helping xenobiologist Lain with a black willow - a mobile and dangerous tree, she needs to explore her grandfather's papers and discovers the family birth certificates but hers is missing and a strange file on a woman named Esme whose picture shows her to be one of the people who are starring in her dreams of Oz.

The story is action-packed and has great worldbuilding. I love that Tinker hasn't lost her human heart in her transformation to elf. I also like the look at Elven culture and the ways it is suited to a race that is potentially immortal. 

This book was immensely engaging and entertaining. I do recommend reading TINKER before this one despite the information catch-up of the prologue. While this book can stand alone, much depth and richness would come from reading TINKER first. 

Favorite Quote:

"So, on top of the royal troops and the oni, we have an unaligned dragon running loose in Pittsburgh."

"Well, a party is only fun if you invite lots of interesting people."

She stuck her tongue out at him.

I bought this one. You can buy your copy here.