I gave it 2.5 stars

THE LAST WOLF wasn't an instant hit for me and I still can't decide if I would want to read more.

The beginning of THE LAST WOLF was very slow and I just didn't really totally understand what was going on. Even after the opening, I didn't really understand what and who I was reading about until I got to know the characters better. Silver lives in a world where because she is crippled, she isn't considered an equal, but she is still very loyal to her pack mates.

The world building could have been better. The beginning tells the history of the pack, but It was hard to jump from that into the story as it felt like I was reading about the same character for a little bit. There were some pacing issues and also some things that were explained in weird ways.

Even months later I can't decide if I enjoyed THE LAST WOLF or if I just enjoyed getting through it. There was some good points, but there were also some things that needed some work. I don't think I would read more, but I'm not ruling it out either.


* This book was provided free of charge from the publisher in exchange for an honest review.

Do not call her a werewolf. Silver Nilsdottir, the heroine of Maria Vale’s The Last Wolf, is Pack — part of a group of wolves that has learned to live in “skin” and adopt human behaviors to survive. But as the runt of the litter, Silver is unwanted and must survive the callousness of Pack, the encroaching humans and the sneaky Shifters who exploit her kind’s vulnerabilities.

He doesn’t know what to call himself. As half-Pack, half-Shifter Tiberius Leveraux doesn’t fit into any world, but he certainly knows where Silver belongs — with him!

While the themes of acceptance and belonging run deep through this story, it is the amazing worldbuilding and intricate mythology that will have readers falling in love with Vale’s debut novel. (See an excerpt from The Last Wolf on HEA.)

So this one sounded like it would be a pretty interesting paranormal romance but it really was just mediocre for me.

I like the world building of the pack and how they seemed much more old world. Nothing like how a lot of the werewolf romances are these days. It was very much a pack oriented type setting with your alphas and then your low person in the pack who is Silver. Silver was never supposed to live and has a crippled leg. Pack wolves do not associate with shifters and shifters hate packs and are known to kill packs.

Tiberius is a shifter who hates the wolf inside him and when the pack finds him, he explains how he heard that sometimes packs will take in a wayward shifter, but someone has to attach themselves to the shifter and teach the ways of the pack. This is pretty much lower than low thing to do so of course Silver decides to do it because how much lower can she go.

Silver has a lot riding on this because if she can’t get Tiberius to go the way of the pack then it won’t turn out good for her. She tries to get Tiberius to embraces his wolf but it won’t do it. Of course they are going to get to know each other and fall for each other, but Tiberius is keeping a rather big secret that could change the pack.

I really liked Silver and Tiberius as they were at the bottom of this whole pack status but they worked hard to rise above it. Especially Silver, she was pretty much snubbed by everyone. I thought they made a great couple. Like I said before I really liked the way the pack was as it really made you feel like you were in a pack of wolves and not werewolves. They were very old world and far from the modern day things. They had names for the meat that shifters eat, etc. If you killed it, you ate it and that could go from a person to a muskrat. 🙂

Overall, I thought it was interesting but it just didn’t wow me. I can’t even say if I will continue with the series because it just didn’t grip me enough to feel like I need to find out what will happen next with the pack.

I tried, but unfortunately not my cup of tea. Will definitely work for other readers.

This is the first book I have read by this author and while it took a little to get into it once I was I could not stop reading.This was a new take on shifters and it was really interesting.I will definitely be checking out more from Maria in the future I enjoyed it

I tried, I really did. However, I gave up on this book and DNF'd it 14% of the way through. This book was a bit too wordy for me and there were too many rules to the world that weren't explained up front. In this case, an info dump in the beginning would have been welcome.

I have to admit that even though I got this as an ARC, I just couldn't finish this book. There were both good and bad elements of it, but the story didn't hold my interest at all. The action often felt rushed and missing detail, events racing along without being dwelled on or impacting the characters. This might have been forgivable had the characters been interesting, but they felt like cliches and lacked personality, meaning I felt little connection to them and little inclination to care about their struggles.

However, there were some good things about this book. The start of the story was intriguing, introducing us to Vale's interesting worldbuilding. The behaviour of the werewolf pack was an interesting departure from the usual tropes of werewolf stories - they acted and were organised more like a wolf pack than a human society.

Overall, the worldbuilding was interesting, and the start of the story seemed like it might be going somewhere interesting, but the characters and the plot from about halfway through the book let the promising beginning down. In some ways this feels like a first draft that still needs refinement; good ideas, but lacking in execution.

I received an advance copy of his book through Netgalley in exchange for an honest review.

I found the world created in this new Urban Fantasy title by Maria Vale to be fresh and unique. The author has created a world of wolves who spend some of their time in "skin" but must remain as wolves during three days of the Iron Moon. I haven't read an Urban Fantasy this enjoyable since discovering Patricia Briggs and Ilona Andrews. However, I felt the author should have taken longer in this book to establish the world-building before rushing into the sexual relationship of the two MCs. And some of the descriptions were very animalistic and unsettling (the debrading of wounds, for example and some of the sex scenes). It was a little off-putting, and will cause me to recommend with care keeping my customer's sensibilities in mind. I am looking forward to reading the next title in the series about one of the wolves who has spent most of is time Offland, and who may be more "human" than Silver. She's a great character, no doubt about it, but I wish the author had spent more time world-building and less time describing the sexual activities of the two MCs; Thanks for approving me to read the galley!!

The Last Wolf is the first book of Marie Vale's Legend of All Wolves, it's also her debut novel. The Last Wolf isn't the last wolf in existence it's Silver's pecking order in the pack, she has the least amount of power, strength all because when she shifts she only has three good legs, and she is a runt. Unless she's paired up with someone she basically become a slave to her alphas. The Great North Pack is exactly what it seems it is the greatest and the strongest pack in all of North America. They have strict rules that must be followed to insure the safety of the pack it's how they lasted this long. Silver has only dreamed of moving up in the pack, she knows it hopeless until one day the stranger shows up.

This is not really your standard PNR werewolf/shifter romance. What really sets it apart from the others is that they are wolves, their true form is wolf they just have been blessed with the ability to transform in to human, the only stipulation is that for the full moon they have no choice but to be wolves. The book starts in England hundreds of years ago when the wolf packs were dying off because the human population was getting to great and they migrated to the new country. They bought land and set it up to where they would always have it and have a safe place to live without human interaction. Because this is the first book of a new series there's a lot of setting up and explaining of lore and how things work in the pack. But it makes sense how it is done and the reason is twofold, Silver has to explain how things are done to Tiberius as a new pack member and at the same time explain it to us the reader.

When the wounded stranger first appears asking for sanctuary the alpha turns him down because he is only half wolf the other half is something the wolves have learned no to trust, a shifter. But Silver sees a strong male who could help her gain rank in the pack and at the risk of everything she pairs with him. Tib doesn't realize it at the time but when Silver agreed to their pairing she no longer was pack and when he heals Tib and Silver have to earn their way in by fighting the alphas. Silver and Tib barely make it back in. They gradually go from friends to lovers but Tib's big secret is keeping him from fully mating with Silver. The secret is one that has the potential to break what little trust the pack and Silver have in him.

Overall, I love how primal they are as a pack they are first and foremost wolves and humans second. They are self sufficient for the most part and only interact with humans as needed. They do let pack members out for education and such but they always come back. I love how in depth the lore goes and the fact that the characters in the book make fun of the werewolf pop culture. Silver and Tib are quite the couple he makes a crappy wolf and she makes a crappy human but what they share goes deeper than that and really enjoyed them and I really enjoyed this world Vale has created, I look forward to more books.

I ended up DNFing this one. I just couldn't get into the story/invested in the characters

So I am between three and four stars. I have to say that there is a lot of this book I felt was unnecessary, all the background, the strange language, it just seemed like extra. But at the heart of this book, is such a beautiful story. One of a wolf and a shifter, who have both been on the outside of the world, for every different reasons. Mostly because they are different.

Quicksilver is the sole survivor of a viscous human attack on her family, she is disabled as a wolf, and lives in a pack where that makes her the very last in the pack. She has always known that she will not be more than that, and for the most part has accepted her fate, but then the fates change, and she is then able to have a chance at being something more in the pack, when a lone shifter (though he is half wolf) comes to pack seeking refuge, and she offers to be his shielder while they prove to the pack that they can be valuable.

Tiberius is a shifter who has never been a real shiftier. His mother was a wolf, and his father a shifter, and so he has lived with someone who identifies as animal most of the time and a parent who identifies as human most of the time, and this has caused so much conflict within him. But when he meet Quicksilver, he finds that he can learn to walk the line between his two sides. He lets her lead him to a new place that they could both be happy with.

Overall I have to say I really enjoyed this book, and I am more than willing to read if there is more in the series to be read.

For three days out of thirty, when the moon is full and her law is iron, the Great North Pack must be wild.

If she returns to her Pack, the stranger will die.
But if she stays…

Silver Nilsdottir is at the bottom of her Pack’s social order, with little chance for a decent mate and a better life. Until the day a stranger stumbles into their territory, wounded and beaten, and Silver decides to risk everything on Tiberius Leveraux. But Tiberius isn’t all he seems, and in the fragile balance of the Pack and wild, he may tip the destiny of all wolves…

Review:

A very unique take on werewolves, where they are more in touch with their wolf selves and don't see themselves as humans. Shifters and humans are to be mistrusted. I liked how they are really more like a pack and in touch with nature and their environment. I really liked Silver, especially how she is perceived as the weakest in the pack, is really one of the strongest and smartest. Ti is good, but was not sure what to make of him for a bit of the book. Of course, he does not understand how the pack works because he is a shifter and grew up more human than wolf. There romance was a slow build and really it is more a secondary thing. There is a lot of action in the story, especially near the end as Ti's past comes back to haunt him and the pack.

I would consider this story more Urban Fantasy with romantic elements, as I feel it really is a story about the characters growth. this is the first book in this new series and I am very curious to see where the series goes.

4Stars
*I voluntarily read an advance reader copy of this book provided by the publisher.*

The Last Wolf is the first book in a new series by Maria Vale. Maria is a debut author and I am definitely a fan. She has designed a fresh and intricate new world surrounding the lore of werewolves and shapeshifters. It’s a great spin on these ancient creatures that have been depicted in so many ways throughout history. The story starts off in the 1600s and comes into 2018 where we see how the modern world affects how mystical creatures have altered their survival tactics.

At the core of The Last Wolf, it’s an unlikely lovely story involving a werewolf named Silver and a shifter named Tiberius. However, there is a lot more to it than that. The book also focuses on tradition, trust, and betrayal as well as the concept of nature versus nurture. Silver grew up in the pack and fully accepts their traditions. She is not comfortable being in human form and has no clue how to maneuver in the human world. On the other hand, Tiberius is the exact opposite. He feels out of place when he comes to live with the pack for sanctuary and he is very much a human. It’s a simple case of how Tiberius was raised to shun the part of him that’s a werewolf because he is half-shifter/half-werewolf. Silver is the runt of her pack and is destined to always be at the bottom of the hierarchy although her lineage is that of werewolf royalty. Together, Silver and Tiberius embark on a journey of love and acceptance not only of each other but of all parts of their heritage. They truly complement each other.

There is nothing about The Last Wolf that’s predictable or cliche. I was pleasantly surprised by all of the new concepts that the author introduced in this often told tale of the supernatural. I can’t say enough about how impressed I was with the writing and imagination that went into this book. I can’t wait for the next book.

The Last Wolf book is the best wolf book I have ever read. I can’t even use the term ‘werewolf’ because the author does not use that term except in reference to movie portrayals of werewolves.

The members are the Great North Pack are either wild or they are in their skin. Silver prefers to be wild, but wears skin when needed. At the beginning of her story, she is a nilding – an unpaired wolf obligated to serve her echelon’s alpha. A most undesirable position. Her chance to change her lot appears when a stranger shows up, wounded and begging for sanctuary.

Taking a chance on Tiberious puts the runt Silver on the path to becoming the wolf she could be. Not because of Tiberious, but in spite of him. What follows is a fascinating look into the life, customs and philosophy of the wolf pack. Through Silver’s eyes, the reader is treated to the wildness of the great northern outdoors that she loves so well. Through Silver’s eyes, the pack relationships are detailed and brought to heartbreaking and heartwarming life. And through Silver’s eyes, the stranger becomes a integral part of a pack even though he is not one of them and is not even trusted.

The climax of the book will bring all of these elements together in a very satisfying conclusion. Though this is the first book of a series, the story is complete on it’s own. I am very please to have found this book and I will look forward to the next in the series.

Through Netgalley, the publisher provided a copy of this book in exchange for an honest review.

The Last Wolf seems like it would be your standard paranormal romance fare, but ends up to be something quite different. The best way to describe it is as similar to Anne Bishop's Others series - if you were hoping for more in the romance department with Meg and Simon. I know I'm not alone in this!

The first three quarters of this book were really strong. The author introduced readers to her version of werewolf/shifter culture and the main characters, Silver and Ti. Since this is the first book in the series, there was a significant amount of time spent on setting the stage. While this kind of world building isn't for everyone, I personally felt that it was necessary as an introduction into the rules that the author establishes for her world. Where I felt the story lost some momentum was in the last third of the book. A big secret is revealed and I felt that it took the book in a direction that was unnecessary. The story was already strong without this additional conflict, that I ended feeling that this big secret was less genuine the stronger beginning of the book.

The Last Wolf is a paranormal romance that's heavy on plot, but balances that complexity well with a romance not without its challenges. I appreciated the fact that the author presents her werewolves as "other" instead of the more human-motivated characters that generally crop up in paranormal romance. For me, the uniqueness of Vale's world and characters will have me back for book two.

Debut author Maria Vale weaves a lyrical, at times haunting paranormal story about werewolves living in today's world. This is not a light, frothy read, but a deep, dense, dark tale of love, loss, and sacrifice.

Silver Nilsdottir has little chance for a decent life living at the bottom of her pack's social structure. Her only chance is to mate, with hope for a spot into the pack as more than her alphas' slave. When a wounded stranger arrives, he might just be her salvation...or the end of everything she knows.

Tiberius Leveraux is more than he seems. The mystery surrounding him grows, as does his connection with the wild Silver. But just when they seem to be building a deeper bond, secrets rise and threaten the pack--and Silver--leaving Tiberius with no way out but to destroy his past and any hope for a future with his mate.

Vale's treatment of werewolves is decidedly different, a fresh take on the paranormal genre. She writes with care, and her lush, descriptive narrative serves to flesh out the characters, giving them added dimension. 

Nothing is easy or glossed over in Vale's world, and the nuances in pack logic and wisdom make the story that much richer. A definite addition to any fantasy or paranormal romance lover's shelf. 

I look forward to the next in Maria Vale's THE LEGEND OF ALL WOLVES series, A WOLF APART.

4.5 Hearts, SJ, Romance Junkies

The Last Wolf by Marie Vale is a new spin on werewolf lore. I felt it was a bit slow going at the beginning but it soon picked up. I always find it difficult to delve into a new world. The wolves in The Lasts Wolf hold true to form. They embrace everything about themselves, uniquely wolf. Vale does a great job of creating new vocabulary for things we are familiar with. Tiberius and Silver are a different kind of couple. Vale delightfully describes Silvers in all her glory. There is beauty in the imperfection of character, both physically and emotionally that brings a sense of authenticity to the story. I look forward to book two, I'd love to delve deeper into this world with these characters. I loved the cover of this book.

3.5 Stars

Maria Vale's debut novel THE LAST WOLF is an immersive tale of identity, trust, and love. It's a fresh take on the werewolf subgenre, steeped in history and tragedy. It is also wildly funny, completely endearing, and stomach-churningly violent.

The book blurb (above) does a good job with setting up the plot. Tiberius (Ti) Levereaux shows up injured at the Great North Pack's territory in the Adirondack region of upstate New York. Silver's pack works on the buddy system, with every wolf having a "shielder." Hers has just been kicked out for being several kinds of awful, which means that she's been demoted to the absolute lowest position in the pack, a wolf who serves the alpha and has no hope of a mate or change in status. A large part of the reason for this is that Silver only has use of three legs in her wolf form, meaning she can't keep up with the pack and can't effectively fight in the challenges that determine pack hierarchy. When Ti shows up, Silver chooses to leave the pack and pair with him. They then have three moon cycles to convince the pack to let them join.

Ti is a shifter, a being that can walk as human at any time, not bound to the Iron Moon. He's also half-wolf, however, and his struggle for a place to belong is central to the book's plot. Ti and Silver exchange many jokes around the idea that Ti is a "crappy wolf," while Silver is a "crappy human."

The pack functions in ways that will be familiar to paranormal romance readers, but also in many ways that I hadn't read before. For example, if a wolf in the pack kills something, s/he has to eat it. Silver ends up eating things that she'd rather not, including, at one point, the penis of a would-be rapist. When I say this book is visceral, I mean literally. There are a couple of scenes of disemboweling. It's a violent and kind of gross world, but the pack doesn't see it as violence, so the reader doesn't either. It's a holistic view of the world - if you kill something, you eat it. If you own hundreds of acres in the Adirondacks, you take the best care of the land that you can. The pack has a network of wolves living "Offland" who come home each full moon and function as lawyers and trust managers the rest of the time. They fight for conservation and against pollution, development, etc.

I loved the inversion of the common PNR trope of wild man and the woman who tames him. Ti is the more human of the two, and they each pull the other toward a midpoint between wild and civilized. It's Ti who waits on sexual contact. It's Silver who rips out throats. Their romance is unconventional but also so familiar. They don't come together in a big swell of emotion, it's a practical partnership that grows into something more. Like a wolfy marriage of convenience. It's quite lovely.

In an attempt to keep this review a reasonable length, I'm going to bullet out a few things you might want to know:

The pack has absolutely no internal racial concerns, which makes sense. They do, however, have a Human Behaviors teacher who teaches the pack about humans and how to act more like them when Offland. It felt like an obvious omission for the book not to address race at all, ever. When Ti and Silver go into town, in that super-white corner of NY? We see that Ti is very polite and careful, but it's not mentioned whether that's for *spoiler reasons* or because he's a black man in a gun-toting white town. It also seems like something that the Human Behaviors teacher should be teaching the Pack. Racism is just as likely (more?) to get them killed in the outside world as being a wolf is.
I can't speak to the quality of the disabled rep in this book. Nothing about it struck me as offensive, but I don't have mobility impairments. If I see a review that covers this better, I'll link it here.
Content warnings: violence, stillbirth, off-page attempted rape, children in peril, massacre in the beginning prologue.
Overall, I gave this book 4/5 stars. It's a really compelling debut with little clues throughout, red herrings, and a hell of a twist. The pacing was steady but I found myself wondering what the plot of the novel was at one point. Did that keep me from enjoying the heck out of it? Nope.

Maria Vale’s The Last Wolf is not at all what I expected. I thought I’d get a fast-paced, spicy shifter romance, much like others I’ve loved. This book, this heroine was unexpected.

In all the right ways.

Shifters and werewolves are different in this world. A werewolf must turn into a wolf during the full moon. Shifters can turn into a wolf but aren’t bound to the form three days a month and are therefore freer to participate in the human world - at least on the fringes. This difference has led to the evolution of two different societies and never the twain shall meet.

Instead of free-wheeling, passion driven shifters, Vale’s werewolves, hidden away on a massive tract of undeveloped land, are rule-driven and orderly. They might live in the woods but they have an elaborate and ritualistic society that is designed to protect the pact first, the individual second. The details of what it means to be a wolf, to hunt and kill, to have to fight for your place in society aren’t prettied up here. They are real and visceral and a bit frightening.

The story is told in the first-person from the heroine’s point of view. Only in this book it’s she who is the pack member, the insider - and the hero who is the fish out of water. Silver has been  so sheltered by the pack that she has never even left their land, not even to go into the nearest town. Silver is a runt, one whom some think should have been left to die because she is  crippled. She is able bodied as a human but in wolf form one of her hind legs is useless, making her slower and weaker than the other wolves. She is unflinching in her self-assessment yet never descends into self-pity. Her disability is something that has bad consequences for her but she just accepts it all and moves on.

Silver loves the land, she loves her pack and she loves her life, even if she knows that the best she can look forward to is a place at the bottom of the pecking order paired with a werewolf who sneaks off to human bars to get drunk and doesn’t really like her much at all.

That might not be a great future but when the wolf she was supposed to be paired with is run off from the pack for being the useless drunk he is, Silver finds herself facing a life alone.

And then a wounded Tiberius stumbles onto the pack’s land.

He’s a shifter and would be banished or  killed outright for the threat his kind poses to the werewolves until Silver steps in to claim him.

This doesn’t mean he’s in, only that he and Silver have three months to convince the pack to let them stay.

The romance in this book is such a slow burn I was expecting it to turn into an urban fantasy, with the love story developing over several books but this is indeed a standalone romance with a satisfying HEA.

At first Silver and Ti are so focused on trying to understand each other, it doesn’t seem as if they are getting any closer. They are both shocked and confused at how the other half lives. Ti can’t believe Silver has never been to a mall, let alone college., whileSilver is horrified that Tiberius sleeps wrapped up in sheets indoors every night. I loved this part of the book. The slow and subtle shift from bemused to curious to fascinated is well done and it just made that first kiss all the hotter.

And here’s where the pacing picks up. As Silver and Ti fall more and more in love, the faster the pacing of both the romance itself and the secondary story line of the pack; and I was turning the pages as fast as I could to see what would happen next.

Silver is viewed as weak by her pack but she proves her strength of will. She sees what she wants and fights for it so hard, even if she doesn’t expect to win. She fights to protect her pack, she fights to make a place for herself and Tiberius within the pack and she fights for her own well-deserved happy ending.

Buy it at: A/BN/iB/K
~ Julia Broadbooks

Book Info
Mass Market Paperback, 320 pages
Expected publication: February 6th 2018 by Sourcebooks Casablanca
ISBN 1492661872 (ISBN13: 9781492661870)
SeriesThe Legend of All Wolves #1
Other Editions (1)
Source:Netgalley EARC

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BOOK BLURB


For three days out of thirty, when the moon is full and her law is iron, the Great North Pack must be wild. Silver Nilsdottir is a lone runt with a crippled leg, facing a life of endless submission in the Pack.

Then Tiberius Leveraux stumbles wounded into their territory with a plea for protection. If Silver is to make a real place for herself, she must fight for Tiberius—her only chance at ever having a mate. And in the end, she is forced to shield all of them—the Pack, the land, and the man she loves—from ancient enemies.

My Thoughts


Just when thought had nothing left to experience as far as werewolf or shifter mythology read this particular tale and found out I was wrong.

Their may be other series similar, have read several reviews pointing this out, but have not read them yet and am going on the assumption that if and when I do the differences will be enough to make it not matter to me anyway.

What I loved was the way the world was set up as we start the story years in the past when the Pack was moved into the New World because humans had almost wiped werewolves out for the most part and starting over in uncharted territories was the only hope for future generations to survive and prosper.

What I did not love was the way in which Silvers current Pack treated her, or any other one of the weaker wolves born into their ranks for that matter. I do understand about the strongest having a better chance of surviving but as she ultimately proved over and over even a crippled runt can not only survive but flourish if their will is strong enough.

Luckily for Silver her life changes by a sheer whim of fate when a badly wounded strange male Shifter finds the Packs lair. Luck that at first seems so wonderful and holds great hope for both their futures, however if it seems to be good to be true it usually is.

I enjoyed this foray into what turned out to be a unique story with quite a few darker moments that were unexpected and then lightened up just as unexpectedly.

While it was a different look into the werewolf lifestyle there were many things that stayed true to what we all have heard many times over from other sources, books, movies and television shows that have been made popular over the years.

Thankfully this first tale ended on a pretty positive note rather than not, although there were heartbreaking moments before it ended.

[EArc from Netgalley]

On every book read as soon as it is done and written up for review it is posted on Goodreads and Netgalley, once released then posted on Amazon, Barnes and Nobles as well.