A rounded up 3.5 stars.

I read all of the stories, but since I'm only familiar with half of the series, that's what the rating and reviews are for. ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

SEEING EYE- PATRICIA BRIGGS
This is the get together origin story of a couple who appear as supporting characters in the Alpha & Omega series. I really enjoyed seeing more of Moira, the blind white witch whose strong morals led her to destroy her own eye as a young girl rather than fall prey to Kouros, a coven leader: "Sacrifice is good for power," she said again. "But it works best if you can manage to make the sacrifice your own."

This story is her chance to help bring Kouros down when Tom, a werewolf, approaches her to help save his brother who has been taken by the coven for a fatal ritual. The plot moved along at a nice pace, but we went from zero to one hundred red roses very, very quickly on Tom's end. He and Moira were strangers locked in a pact of mutual cooperation and by the literal end of the day, Tom was calling her family. Partially the nature of werewolf fiction, but eh, not Into That.

LAST CALL - JIM BUTCHER
I forgot how much the Dresden books remind me of A Series of Unfortunate Events in the way it explains magic much like Lemony Snicket explains "big words". But Harry's always good for a laugh.

I shook my head at Murphy and said, "Let him scamper, Murph."

She let him go, and Caine fled for the stairs on his hand and knee, sobbing. He staggered out, falling down the first flight, from the sound of it.

I wrinkled up my nose as the smell of urine hit me. "Ah. The aroma of truth."

BACON - CHARLAINE HARRIS
Dahlia, a vampire widow, contacts a witch to make plans to annihilate an entire pack of werewolves for their "legal murder" of her own werewolf husband. The witch is a descendant of Circe and they have a hilarious back and forth about the size of Odysseus's dick (since Circe kept him on her island for a year, he had to be good for something, right?)

Weirdly, amongst the vampires and werewolves and witches, what I found most implausible was the story they used to spy on their suspected murderer. The idea of some rando guy claiming to be from the local university to film children "for a short feature" would not fly? Like, at all? I worked as a photographer employed by a school district and we still needed permission for certain events. Privacy is a thing they took seriously then (2005-2007) and it's increased ever since.

In the end, Dahlia is a Stone Cold Bitch and I am here for it.

SIGNATURES OF THE DEAD - FAITH HUNTER
I stopped reading the Jane Yellowrock series mostly because I hated her love interests so much, but this story starts from the POV of her earth witch friend Molly, as they work together with a police officer to find a group of rogue vampires who had brutally murdered an innocent family. Seeing Jane from an outsider's point of view makes me want to try this series again. It has a much more violent, realistic tang to the concept of Other existing alongside humans.