Hemlock

Title:  Hemlock

Author: Kathleen Peacock

Publisher: Katherine Tegen Books

Publish Date:  8 May 2012

Pages: 416

ISBN:  978-0062048653

Source:  Bought

Genre:  YA, romance, werewolves

Series:  Hemlock

Other books in series:  tbd

Rating: Liked

Mackenzie and Amy were best friends.

Since then, Mac's life has been turned upside down. She is being haunted by Amy in her dreams, and an extremist group called the Trackers has come to Mac's hometown of Hemlock to hunt down Amy's killer:

A white werewolf.

Lupine syndrome--also known as the werewolf virus--is on the rise across the country. Many of the infected try to hide their symptoms, but bloodlust is not easy to control.

Wanting desperately to put an end to her nightmares, Mac decides to investigate Amy's murder herself. She discovers secrets lurking in the shadows of Hemlock, secrets about Amy's boy-friend, Jason, her good pal Kyle, and especially her late best friend. Mac is thrown into a maelstrom of violence and betrayal that puts her life at risk.

Kathleen Peacock's thrilling novel is the first in the Hemlock trilogy, a spell-binding urban fantasy series filled with provocative questions about prejudice, trust, lies, and love.

What would you do if your best friend was killed by a werewolf attack?  That is what happened to Mackenzie.  The Lupine Syndrome virus has been on the rise recently.  Mackenzie tries to do things as normal after the death of Amy, but she is haunted by dreams of her.  These make her want to try to solve Amy’s murder.

Amy’s grandfather, Senator John Walsh, however, has other plans.  He invited a group of Trackers into the area to help find the wolf responsible.  Trackers are militant killers whose specialty is werewolves.  Weird things start happening after the Trackers come into town.  Mac’s two best friends, Kyle and Jason, start acting different. 

Regs for Werewolves, RfW, who are werewolf right activists, set up a “peaceful protest” when the Trackers have their recruitment meeting.  That is when Mac discovers that Jason is intending to join the Trackers.  He was Amy’s boyfriend and her murder has spurred him on to hating the werewolves.  Mac wants to help Jason, but that is proving to be more difficult than she had anticipated.  Kyle is suddenly acting different around Mac.  There is also the other girl in school who he seems to scare him at times.  

Then kids are being pulled out of school by the trackers, thinking that they are werewolves.  This can be violent at times.  Is this what Hemlock needs to get over the tragedy of Amy’s death?  Will the Mackenzie finally be able to solve Amy’s murder?  What is going on with Kyle and Jason? 

When I first heard about this book, I don’t know what it was about it, but I wanted to read it.  Maybe it was the cover.  Maybe it was because it has to do with werewolves.  I was hoping that this book would be different than the other werewolf books I’ve read and it was.  I liked the way Peacock wrote the characters in this book.  There are characters you want to like and those that you don’t.  It is just cut and dry.  My opinion about the characters changed while reading this book.   

Even though this book is about a paranormal subject - werewolves, it doesn't seem like that much of a "fairy tale."  I could see why some of the events happened in the book.  It also wouldn't be too far of a stretch for me to imagine something like that happening today.  I cannot wait until June 2013 until the next book in this series comes out.  I will be watching for it.