Wolves of Wisteria

By: Angela Pepper

Narrated by: Rosemary Benson

Length: 11 hrs and 26 mins

Publisher's summary

Zinnia Riddle doesn't use her witch powers much these days. She works as a clerk at the Wisteria Permits Department, where there hasn't been much need for spells and potions...until now.

When a beloved coworker is found dead next to her desk, the whole office gets paranoid. Is one of them a killer? Did the victim leave behind clues in the book she was writing? Is there a town-wide conspiracy, or is some lone serial predator on the loose?

The police are always two steps behind the evil that's threatening the peaceful town. Now it's up to Zinnia Riddle and the witches in her coven to uncover the secrets hiding in plain sight.

Will Zinnia's rusty magic hold up against a powerful enemy?

Wolves of Wisteria is the sixth book set in the Wisteria Witches Mysteries universe and the first book featuring Zinnia Riddle in her own thrilling mystery!

©2018 Angela Pepper Publishing (P)2018 Angela Pepper Publishing

Prefer Zara as a main character, but very good.

I enjoyed the first several books in the series very much. This doesn’t quite measure up, but is still very good if you enjoy Wisteria. The narrator did very well. The only thing that bothered me is she didn’t pronounce “Zara” the same way as the original narrator. I anticipated some characters would sound different, but the pronunciation of the name for one of the main character’s in the series seems pretty important to keep consistent.

Shift in Tone and Pace but Still Solidly Wisteria

This book was given to me for free at my request and I provided this voluntary review.
This is the 6th book in the Wisteria Witch Mysteries by Angela Pepper and the first book about Zara’s aunt Zinnia.
The story takes place almost entirely before Zara and Zoey arrive in Wisteria. As such it has a different tone and cast than the first 5 books.
Zinnia is more responsible and less zany than Zara. She is more experienced with witchcraft so there is less joy of discovery and exploration of the world and wonders of this quirky, charming suburbia.
The format of the story is more about office life and the ole of your coworkers as a pseudo family as they discover that one of their co-workers was murdered. This down put a bit of a downer on the book. Although Zara deals with ghosts, more are completely unknown to her to here we have people grieving and dealing with how you carry on after losing an acquaintance.
In a meta twist, the co-worker in question was a writer in her spare time and fashioned a fantastic fan fic where each of her co-workers possessed magical powers or properties. How much did she know and how much was a fun story? There are also plenty of jokes about writing including how some series decide to split off with a side character.
Angela Pepper gets to flex some different muscles with this series but there are plenty of connections and call forwards to the main series – including relatives of and cameos from town residents we know and love.
This story had a few scenes that were more intense than I’ve come to expect from the author and frequent flashbacks made the real slightly more challenging than previous installments.
By the time you get to the end everything falls into place. I’m glad the next volume is already available and ready to launch into.
Rosemary Benson has the unenviable task of being the second narrator of the series after Tiffany Williams has narrated the first five. It makes sense that Zara and Zinnia have different voices and so while I did need to adjust my expectations, she did an excellent job managing the voices of the new cast of characters and making known characters recognizable while still giving her own performance rather than try to mimic Williams. She is a wonderful narrator in her own right.

great book and series

I love this whole series. It's funny but still has all trials of everyday life.

Wolves

Finally we get to learn a bit more about Zinnia. If you have been following the Wisteria Witches series, you've learned much of Zara's story, and Zinnia, her aunt, has been a side character. In this novel, however, Zinnia comes into her own. Does this mean you need to have read any of the other books? No. This is absolutely a stand-alone novel. What it does have is the Easter eggs and tie-ins to the other stories for those who enjoy all the parts of a series. Seen from her own perspective, Zinnia is far less eccentric and quite a competent witch. And, as always, author Angela Pepper has put together an intriguing mystery with all sorts of paranormal intricacies. It is appropriate that there is a different narrator, Rosemary Benson, with a slightly deeper voice, acting out Zinnia's story, and she is every bit as talented.

A great addition to the Wisteria witch cozy books

I was excited to learn that more Wisteria witch books were coming to Audible. I loved Wisteria Witches, the first book about Zara, and I can't help comparing them. Wolves of Wisteria is from Zara's aunt Zinna's point of view. Unlike Zara, who is a new witch, Zinnia is a trained and capable witch, so this book is full of magic spells and information on the supernatural community. The mystery kicks off right away, with a murder at Zinnia's office and the supernatural events keep coming from there. Zinnia's friendships with Detective Fung and Margaret are some of the most fun aspects of the book and they provide a lighter counterpoint to the darker aspects of the murder. Zinnia isn't as funny as Zara, but I found her quirky, witchy ways were as much fun to listen to. Near the end of the book, Zinnia's story dovetails with Zara's, providing some new perspective on Zara's arrival in Wisteria. This book does provide some background information about the Riddle family, but leaves a lot of questions unanswered, both about Zinnia's past and the rest of the family (the mystery is resolved, no worries there). I get the feeling that the Riddle family history will be explored more in future books. The very end of this book sets up the next and I definitely want to hear about it.

Great story!

The book started out a little slow and it was a different narrator than her other books but the longer it went the better it got. Great story and I'm ready to listen to the next one.

Outstanding book/ series!

This book is book 6/15 in the Wisteria Witches Mysteries series, and book 1/2 in the Wisteria Witches Mysteries: City Hall Books.
I have thoroughly enjoyed all of these books so far! They are witty and funny, to where I’m laughing out loud and people are looking at me in public places! 😂
They have great mysteries to solve.
They have a great family of characters one grows to love more with each book!
I recommend everything related to Wisteria by this author to everyone!
You won’t want to stop listening like me, and you will be put in a great mood as well!

Fun!

witches, magic, supernatural, suspense, murder-investigation, law-enforcement, urban-fantasy

Zinnia Riddle is a witch in a town that has lots of magic but nobody admits to being supernatural. The suspense and excitement begins when Zinnia arrives at work only to find the mutilated body of her nonmagical coworker. Call in the local detective and crew! And the specialty department that exists to manage anything possibly magical. A great cast of characters, peppered with humor, and a real plot make this a great read.
It's also the first in a series that's a prequel to the Wisteria Witches mysteries.
Rosemary Benson is the very convincing audio performer.

Slow beginning/better ending

I had to force myself to continue to read in the beginning. It was very slow moving and not really interesting. Maybe 2/4 of the way through it started to get good but not the greatest. The ending was way better and kind of put the rest of the books together. I will continue to read the series hopefully the next one will be better.

Another winner!

I loved this book. I had read Wisteria Witches first. This is like an introduction to that book. This has a different narrator but both narrators did an excellent job with the narration.

I couldn't put it down!

I was given this free review copy audiobook at my request and have voluntarily left this review.