Since I loved the first two books in this series, I saw no reason not to borrow the exciting conclusion from my library when I was between audiobooks. I say series, but these are really standalone books that can be read in any order.
I had heard of Calamity Jane before reading this book, but I really don’t know much about her. As such, I can’t say for sure how much of this is based on fact and how much is pure fiction. The same goes for Annie Oakley. I knew a little bit about her, and while I’ve never actually seen “Annie Get Your Gun,” I’m familiar enough with it to get at least most of the references that were in this book, if not all of them.
The concept of the book is that Wild Bill’s Wild West Show was a cover for Bill and his team to hunt werewolves, although in this book they’re called garou (pronounced guh-roo).
In this world, in addition to changing into a wolf at the full moon (all three nights) they also change during times of high emotions.
Bill doesn’t kill all garou. To those recently bitten, he gives a speech full of tips on how to live as a garou without hurting anyone. Jane calls it his “So You’re a Garou” speech.
Jane’s parents were both garou. Her dad killed her mom when she got out of control, but not before she bit him. He had a hard time coping with being a garou. He couldn’t hold down a job and drank away what little money they had. Jane finally reported him to the authorities as a garou, then made sure not to be around when they came to “take care of” him. She’s lived with that guilt ever since.
Turns out Bill was the one who actually killed her dad, and leaving a bunch of girls orphaned didn’t sit right with him so he tracked down Jane and invited her to join his show. It’s never explained how Jane got separated from her sisters, but presumably they’re all off living their own lives.
The book starts when Annie Oakley leaves her oppressive family to join Wild Bill’s Wild West Show. She has her own history with garou, having been held captive and enslaved by a family of garou when she was a child. So when she finds out Bill and his team are also garou hunters, she’s a little too eager to help out. She sees garou only as monsters with no redeeming qualities.
The problem with that is that Bill’s adopted son, Frank, is a garou who has managed to live peacefully with his “condition” most of his life. Although he and Annie are instantly attracted to each other, he fires her from the show when he realizes how she feels about garou. Annie is not great at taking no for an answer, so when she presses him for an explanation, he blurts out that he’s a garou and she realizes her mistake and decides to make up for it in the form of hunting down Jane.
Jane was bit by a garou while they were out hunting garou. She doesn’t know Frank is a garou, so she’s afraid the team will reject her if they know she’s now a garou. But she’s listened to Bill’s “So You’re a Garou” speech enough times to know how to manage her new condition.
Jane hears about a supposed cure for garou in Deadwood, so she heads that way to get cured, figuring she can rejoin the team once she’s been cured. She takes off in the middle of the night, but of course Bill, Frank, and Annie all figure out what’s happened and where she’s headed, and they all go after her.
Of course the cure doesn’t turn out to fulfill its promise, and Jane and her friends have to team up to defeat a seriously evil villain.
The story includes a queer romance and recognition of how white settlers treated Native Americans. There’s acknowledgement that Native Americans have better things to do than sit around waiting for an opportunity to rescue white folks, but they still show up just in time to save some white folks. On the other hand, Annie did save one of the Native Americans first, so it’s not all about what the white people need.
This book is just as much fun as the other two in this series, so if you’re a fan of paranormal alternate histories and you have not yet checked out these three authors, I highly recommend you do so.