Review--Wrong Side of Dead by Kelly Meding

Monster hunter Evangeline Stone woke up on the wrong side of dead this morning—and now there’s hell to pay.

Barely recovered from her extended torture at the hands of mad scientist Walter Thackery, Evy can use a break. What she gets instead is a war, as the battered Triads that keep Dreg City safe find themselves under attack by half-Blood vampires who have somehow retained their reason, making them twice as lethal. Worse, the Halfies are joined by a breed of were-creature long believed extinct—back and more dangerous than ever. Meanwhile, Evy’s attempts at reconciliation with the man she loves take a hit after Wyatt is viciously assaulted—an attack traced to Thackery, who has not given up his quest to exterminate all vampires... even if he has to destroy Dreg City to do it. With Wyatt’s time running out, another threat emerges from the shadows and a staggering betrayal shatters the fragile alliance between the Triads, vampires, and shapeshifters, turning Evy’s world upside down forever.

Wow. It's been way too long since I last read the Dreg City books by Kelly Meding. My memory was a total blank in some areas. Luckily, Kelly does the important recaps in Wrong Side of Dead. It helped me somewhat, but other details were still too lost. That's the trouble with reading too many books! Sadly, this is the last book in the series as it was cancelled. There's always help for resurrection though!

This book has two stories going on, one in the past and the other the present. For the most part, we're in the present and the past is really just about a month ago, weeks even. The Triads are gone. The whole system that Evie and Wyatt were apart of has disbursed. There's a new one on the horizon though, composed of Triad members and others, such as the vampires and a few shifter types. They are called the Watch and basically do the same thing the Triads did, fighting evil in Dreg City and keeping the humans safe.

Walter Thackery is still on the loose and still scheming as always. His need to protect and preserve the human race includes killing anything non-human. His skewed personality is due to having his wife and unborn child killed by a Halfie. But he just keeps on killing other "others" and he must be stopped.

When Evie's friend and goddaughter are kidnapped by Thackery, she goes to amazing lengths to save them before he can kill or torment them like he did to her. Although, she was a special case, it's best to never put anything past the madman.

The segments of the present take place in a day. Like I said, there are brief segments--ie a few chapters--where we're in the past about a month ago and it moves forward a bit. But the current time, everything goes down in a day. Including Wyatt being attacked by a werewolf. He battles infection for quite awhile and it doesn't look good for him and it drives Evie to fight even harder. Thackery must die.

It's sad to read a book and know that it is the last in the series unwillingly. I was expecting shocking cliffhanger endings, much like I received in another series I read that was cancelled and I didn't know until later on. But knowing doesn't make it any easier. This ending though wasn't as horrid with the cliffhangers as I thought it would be. True, there's some unfinished business, but the day ends on a somewhat happy note, if not, content.

The action though was pretty awesome! Being just another day in Evie's chaotic life, there was never a dull moment. Although, I was slightly confused with the flashbacks when they started happening. I couldn't quite figure out what their purpose was, until they got moving a little more. Then it made sense and all was well.

Evy is a fun heroine. I feel she is very real and down to earth. She's not the total badass chick in leather--although those are pretty wicked--but she's still pretty kickass. She can handle herself and I feel like that is a good type of heroine. She has her struggles with some physical things since she still cannot get used to the new body she's in, but she tries.

There wasn't too much romance in this one, since in the beginning Evy and Wyatt are on a break and we find out why through some of those flashbacks. Which I keep saying flashbacks, but it's not Evy reflecting on anything, I think it's more like one of those things that benefits the reader, we get to see what she went through.

Overall it was a very good read! I wish I hadn't stayed away too long since my memory recall isn't the hottest thing around when I read so many different books. Going to have more challenges ahead of me when I move onto some other previously untouched series. But I did enjoy this! The series from the beginning has been interesting and there are still so many questions I have about Evy and her abilities that I cannot recall if they were ever answered. It's possible. One of these days I will have to re-read the series. 


Overall Rating 4/5 stars