Crosspost: Shifters #3 - Pride

Crossposted from Feminist Quill; written on September 14, 2015

Title: Pride
Author: Rachel Vincent
Year of Publication: 2009
Series: Shifters
#: 3
Goodreads Rating (Avg.): 4.16
Goodreads Rating (Mine): 3

Warning: Spoilers for Books 1 and 2

Plot Description: Faythe is now on trial by the Pride for intentionally infecting her ex boyfriend Andrew, and then for killing him to cover up the crime. The trial quickly devolves into a sham front for Pride political machinations, Faythe and her family make a LOT of new enemies, and a new young tabby, Kaci, is introduced.

After discovering that she had accidentally infected her ex with a bite while she had been Partially Shifted during sex, Faythe has a showdown with Andrew at the end of Rogue. The easy going and amiable guy she used to know is gone, leaving a stray cat turned crazy by scratch fever. Andrew tries to kill her, and she ends up killing him in self defense. Now she needs to defend her actions in such a way that she escapes being executed for her crimes – or even just permanently declawed.

At this point in my reviewing career, I’m honestly cursing all authors everywhere who think it’s a good idea to write six books into their series. I mean, when you’re a fabulous author and your books are really good – well, that’s amazing. But we can’t all be a Joanne Rowling or a Richelle Mead. Sometimes we’re a Cassandra Clare. Or, God forbid, a Rachel Vincent.  At least Clare had the decency to keep her books short.

I suppose I’m being a bit harsh, because Pride was in fact an improvement on its predecessors. But when you have to keep point the same old sh*t out, and when you have to read the same kinds of reviews on Goodreads – well, it gets tiring.

Once again, it’s easier to survive Vincent’s book if one were to focus on what we in the legal industry call ‘the spirit of’ (the law book), rather than ‘the letter of the book’. That is to say, if one were to look past the book’s faults to the story struggling to be told, and if one were to try and divine the intention behind the story – as opposed to what’s actually expressed…

Faythe proves herself a good fighter in the course of this book, and in the process shows up a couple of enforcers from their rival Calvin Malone’s pack. Pride politics are shown for the first time in the series, and this actually feels a little disconcerting, especially since I was comparing the depiction of werecat politics to the depiction of vampire politics in Vampire Academy. In the latter series, the gradually increasing role of vampire politics didn’t feel forced upon the reader due to expert seeding right from the first book in the series onwards.

The Alphas of the other Prides are introduced, and I feel the atmosphere of Stray gently settle on my shoulders again… and begin to suffocate me. Once again, graphic imagery – of brutal and unforgiving imposition of a patriarchal system upon female members of the system – assaults the reader’s senses. Among the various things debated at the trial is the question of whether Faythe ever plans to get married and have children – if she does not, she’s completely expendable and can be executed for her crimes. If she does, then the usual punishment does not apply to her, and she’d be merely declawed – thus rendering her completely defenseless and dependent on the male members of her Pride for protection.

This brand of sexism is engaged with within the book itself by Faythe, and the fact that she is constantly required to be polite and keep her anger under control only emphasizes the ‘angry feminist’ trope. That is to say, when defending yourself against attacks against your physical and mental integrity, you’re going to have to do so in the most teeth clenchingly civil manner. And they’re just going to ignore everything you have to say anyway.

Things get tenser when they find a very young tabby cat called Kaci, who promptly attaches herself to Faythe. When considered in addition to Manx, the tabby serial killer from Rogue who had been taken into protective custody by Faythe’s Pride, this gave her Pride three tabbies of child bearing age – completely unprecedented. What follows the events of Pride, therefore, is the natural consequence of treating human beings like endangered natural resources. That is to say, war follows – war for the literal possession of women. Talk about feminist dystopia, huh?

The only thing I’m eternally grateful to Pride for – aside from the introduction of Kaci – is the fact that the tribunal exiles Marc from Pride territories, thus opening up the plot for an opportunity for Jace Hammond to take center-stage – romantic plot-wise. Jace is the best, really. I look forward to getting to talk about him for a change.

Pride is an improvement on the first two books in the series – plot-wise, Faythe-wise, and due to the introduction of Werecat Pride politics and open engagement with sexism. In comparison to other books everywhere, however, it still ranks very low.