I loved Marcus and Bard, and the relationship between the two. I felt like I was in Dresden with them, and like Marcus, I didn't want to leave. The conflicts and resolutions were all well-done, too.That said, there were a few things that bothered me. What does it mean when someone's "face defaulted"? This is a phrase that was used several times, and I could sort of figure it out in context, but I struggled with it each time. Also, you could make a drinking game with this book and the use of the word 'droll'. Those are nitpicks. On a larger scale, I never really understood why the anthropomorphic world. I read - and LOVED - Kyell Gold's Out of Position, despite having thought the anthropomorphism sounded weird; it really worked well there. So whereas I went into that one with the animals as a negative, because I loved that one so much I saw them as a positive here. And yet, I kept being startled by reminders that they were animals. It's like I somehow never really saw them as animals, which makes me think I really need to re-read OOP (oh such a hardship ;) to try to figure out how/why it seemed to work so well there. Because I really can't say what's different, just that something is. Though I did feel like there was something about the writing style of this one that held me at something of a distance, maybe that's the key?