History Literature / MercyThompson

* AFormYouAreComfortableWith: Horrifyingly inverted when the Singer in ''Wild Sign'' assumes the form of [[spoiler: Cthulhu.]]
* ArtisticLicenseBiology: Wolf packs in real life more closely resemble extended nuclear families than competition-enforced hierarchies. The "alpha" wolves in a pack are the parents, and the other wolves are their pups from the last few years. Actual fights between pack members are rare, with pups grown to adulthood dispersing to form their own packs rather than challenging their parents. However, the book does make it clear that werewolf behavior does not exactly parallel wild wolf behavior. (Artificial wolf packs formed from random wolves like at zoos, however...)

--> Beauclaire "It is not meet that my daughter's attacker [[spoiler:should live]].

*** Mention is made of one woman who tried to get around this by staying in wolf form full-time until the birth, but doing so meant she completely lost control, ''ate'' the baby, and had to be put down. Only one werewolf woman has ever successfully managed to bear a child -- Bran's wife, who was able to use [[MagicalNativeAmerican her own people's magic]] to suppress the change long enough to bear Charles, but was so weakened by this that she DiedInChildbirth.

* ChildEater: The comic series "Hopecross Jilly" introduces the titular Fae, who craved naughty children in particular. While she wouldn't eat naughty children whole, she would eat only their fingers and toes because it was "the parts that got them into mischief to begin with."

** Hopecross Jilly is an original comic book set after the events of Frost Burned. The comic details Mercy and Adam aiding the local sheriff’s department’s investigation into the mysterious titular fae. The comic is notable for focusing on Jesse and her hardship in school.  

* CoolHouse: As an extremely successful divorce lawyer, it's only natural that Kyle owns a BigFancyHouse. But he takes it to the next level by turning it into a safe haven for (soon-to-be) single mothers - with lavish creature comforts, numerous safes, a bleeding-edge security system (in addition to Warren, his werewolf lover), and a fair number of secret passages (just in case).

** Odder still is the fact that, despite having a CoolHouse, Kyle spends most of his time living with Warren in his low-budget apartment.

** Yo-Yo Girl is the fae's creepy child (fae can use {{Glamour}} to appear however they wish).

** Sufficiently powerful werewolves tend to possess one of these, at least to their pack. Adam and Samuel exhibit a combined one at the climax of ''Moon Called''. Dana Shea (a fae) tries to use one in ''Hunting Grounds'', but only to be countered by [[spoiler:Anna’s]] instinctive use of her own.

* DealWithTheDevil: The community of Wild Sign thinks they're getting the better of a fairy spirit by making an agreement [[spoiler:to have its children in exchange for protection from black witches, but use magical birth control to prevent them from actually conceiving. Becomes EvilIsNotAToy when they are subject to his horrifying revenge.]]

** In the comic "Hopecross Jilly", the titular fae attacks and devours the fingers and toes of children who behave badly. If that isn't bad enough, she then buries them alive (while still missing their parts) and dances over their burial ground. Yikes. Hopecross Jilly also ends up HoistByHerOwnPetard by this, as she keeps trying to find a reason to go after Adam's daughter Jesse and ends up burned to death, as even by Medieval standards of children's behavior (and the Fae), Jesse is a good girl.

** Jesse, a fifteen year old girl, [[spoiler:kills Hopecross Jilly — a centuries-old child-murdering fae SerialKiller.]]

* DyingRace: Walkers like Mercy are extremely rare, as they and other Native American magical beings went into decline along with the cultures that believed in them. [[spoiler:Also, vampires wiped them out whenever they could find them, as the walkers' ability to see ghosts also allows them to locate vampire lairs by day.]]

** The fae also sort of count both as they come from [[LandOfFaerie another plane of being sidelong to ours]] (Underhill), and their true forms can border on nightmare-inducing (such as the Doll Maker from ''Dead Heat'').

** Jesse got beaten up in ''Iron Kissed'' because her father's a werewolf. [[BullyingADragon This, in turn, nearly got her attackers murdered by]] [[PapaWolf an angry Alpha.]]

* InconvenientlyVanishingExoneratingEvidence: Avoided big time in ''Iron Kissed''. After Mercy was [[spoiler:raped by Tim,]] Gray Lord Nemane was going to take all the fae items [[spoiler: Tim]] stole along with the mind-warping goblet that [[spoiler:Tim tricked Mercy into drinking from.]] However, Honey stood up to Nemane and argued that they needed at least the goblet as proof of Mercy’s innocence in the matter. Without it, it would just appear as if Mercy had decided to [[spoiler:randomly kill Tim after having “sex”]] in the surveillance videos. After some convincing from Adam and even Samuel, Nemane acquiesced and allowed them to keep the goblet until Mercy was free of all charges.

* JerkWithAHeartOfGold: Ben is this, full stop. He’s an accused rapist (though Adam says he didn’t do it) and an open misogynist. He also literally puts his life on the line for Mercy at one point, putting himself between an enraged Adam and Mercy to make a point. When someone points out in the second book that he only ever refers to women using slang terms for female genitalia, he makes a concentrated effort to stop.

* LandOfFaerie: Commonly known as Underhill, it was a realm apart ruled by the fae of long ago until its connections to the mortal world were severed. It is later rediscovered by the fae. Oh, and [[GeniusLoci she's sentient]], and is just as capricious and deadly as her former tenants.

* LoveTriangle: Mercy in the middle with Adam and Samuel on the other two corners. [[spoiler:Possibly a Love Quadrangle, given Stefan seems very attached to Mercy as well — attached enough that he protected her from the seethe and chose her over his Mistress. Stefan's attraction for her more or less confirmed in "Night Broken".]]

* MagicalNativeAmerican: Mercy and Charles, somewhat literally. Mercy is a part-Native American shapeshifter, while Charles is a half-Salish werewolf. Hell, Charles can even talk to spirits, he just finds it distracting.

* OurVampiresAreDifferent: Vampires become weak if they don't drink blood every once in a while. Most vampires keep a "flock" of humans at their house to feed on. They can avoid killing if they want to, but of the vampires we've seen, only [[FriendlyNeighborhoodVampire Stefan]] really makes an effort to do so. Being a vampire's "sheep" has fringe benefits — it extends your natural lifespan and gives you resistance to blood-borne diseases like HIV or leukemia. Vampires are dead during the day (but they don't need to return to their original coffin — at one point, Stefan spends the day in Mercy's closet), but come back to unlife at night. They can be killed by the standard methods, but the best one is fire. Beyond that, the circumstances under which any particular vampire is created can sometimes provide them with unique abilities shared by few, if any, of their own kind.
* OurWerewolvesAreDifferent: Werewolves can change shape more or less at will, but changes may be spurred on by strong emotion, and they are forced to change under a full moon. They’re also immune to disease, poisons, and old age (the physical effects, at least -- especially long-lived werewolves can and do suffer madness and dementia). The initial conversion from human to werewolf reverts physical age to mid-twenties or thirties, and most werewolves are somewhere between physically fit and musclebound. Silver is poisonous to them, and more unusually, they can't swim, or only very badly (they’ve got so much raw muscle mass, they become too dense to float). The change is agonizing, and changing from wolf to human takes several minutes. They also have minor WeirdnessCensor powers that encourage {{Muggle}}s to mistake them for dogs, even though they're larger than wolves and have odd anatomy for canids. It won't fool someone who already knows about werewolves and expects to see one, and an actual angry werewolf is too different and dangerous to fool anyone, but a werewolf that's stuck in wolf form but otherwise in control of himself can blend in by just having someone put a collar on him. Werewolves can stay in wolf form for weeks or months at a time, but typically lose control long before then. Last but not least, a single bite won’t Change you — only being savaged to the point where you either become a werewolf (and gain super healing) or die.

** It should also be noted that it's made clear in the series that the wolf aspect of a werewolf is a distinctly separate entity, entirely sentient, that exists independent though intertwined with the human half. This is part of what makes them so dangerous — because the wolf half is capable of usurping the human half in certain situations where it feels cornered or enraged.

* PartTimeHero: No matter what is going on around her, Mercy keeps up her day job as a mechanic. If things get REALLY bad, she'll call Zee and ask him to run her shop.

** The werewolves have a tendency to act like dogs when surrounded by those unfamiliar with werewolves. It’s stated that have a WeirdnessCensor that influences people to see them as dogs unless they are already aware of werewolves.

* WildWilderness: Mostly avoided in Mercy Thompson books, but in the ''Alpha & Omega'' series, Charles and Anna have several adventures in the Montana wilderness.
* WomanWereWoes: Whilst it's perfectly possible for women to become werewolves (and the series features a number of prominent examples, most notably [[TheEmpath Anna Cornick]] the protagonist of the spin off Alpha and Omega), due the fact that inverse becoming a werewolf requires having your body ravaged to the point that if you don't turn your die and the transformation itself is extremely agonising, by nature the vast majority who survive are men. Case point Adam Hauptman's pack and the thus the entire Columbia Basin werewolf population (which is considered quite large by their standards) only has three female members. Due to their rarity female werewolves are highly prized, with packs even having been known to go to war to induct them into their membership. They likewise aren't able to hold rank in their own right (regardless of how dominant or powerful they are) being forced to share the status of their mate.
* WorkingClassWerewolves: Zig-zagged. Most Alpha werewolves tend to be quite well off. Their innate desire to lead others tends to translate into having important and high-paying jobs; even if it doesn't, they can get tribute from their subordinates. Adam, the Alpha of the Tri-Cities pack, runs his own security company. However, some werewolves (particularly lone wolves without packs) still get stuck working menial jobs and struggling to make ends meet. Warren, one of the members of the Tri-Cities pack, worked as a clerk in a convenience store for a long time until his boyfriend (a well-regarded lawyer) got him licensed as a private investigator. Zack, another member of the pack, was working as a dishwasher while living in a cheap motel.

* WrongGenreSavvy: In ''Wild Signs'', a group of white witches make a deal with an ancient being. [[spoiler: They assume that it's a powerful fae of some sort and they'll therefore be safe so long as they [[ExactWords hold up the letter of their bargain]]. Unfortunately for them, it's not fae at all, but some sort of Native American spirit that is infuriated over their breaking the spirit of the deal, and kills them for it]].

* DaylightHorror:
** Vampires are no less scary during the day — ''especially'' the ones who are powerful enough to stay awake while the sun is up. The very concept of a vampire that can walk in the sunlight is so inherently terrifying that, when someone gives the ''vaguest'' of hints that a mutual vampire friend might have that ability, Mercy advises her to immediately drop the subject and never breathe a word of it to anyone else.
** Werewolves also qualify, as they can shapeshift at any time. Really, all sorts of supernatural nasties are capable of running around during the day.

Mercy Thompson herself is a mechanic by day, but she is also a walker - a Native American shapeshifter who can turn into a coyote at will. She was raised by werewolves, and has strong connections with the werewolf community. She also has links with vampires and fae - she fixes cars for the local vampire seethe, and her mentor is a gremlin (or calls himself one, at any rate).

* AdaptationalVillainy: A small case with Adam’s Pack, namely Darryl and Ben, in the Moon Called comic adaptation. In the main book, they were never given any antagonistic moments and Mercy simply took their conversation at the start of book out of context, something even she felt she might have done. Ultimately proving they were both GoodAllAlong. Although the comic book still continues with this twist, it plays up the RedHerring moments more by giving both men a few [[TraitorShot Traitor Shots]] and making them slightly more antagonistic like Darryl threatening Warren and Mercy still distrusting Ben until he saves her life in the climax. Very likely to trick newcomers of the series.

* AllMythsAreTrue: If it's not fae, spirit, werewolf, witch, something else from some mythology, it's probably a human. Also Bran is [[spoiler:the inspiration for Grendel. He never actually fought Beowulf, though; that was the result of someone attaching the stories of the scariest monster they knew to the oral tradition of an already long-dead king]].[[spoiler:Patty also once said that Sam was the Sir Marrok]]. Sir Lancelot, however, is pure fiction.
* AlwaysChaoticEvil: All Demons are evil creatures whose only desire is to destroy and kill as much as they can.
* AltarTheSpeed: Played with. In ''River Marked'', [[spoiler:Adam and Mercy's wedding is expedited because Mercy doesn't want to deal with her mother...who's been been playing the crazy wedding planner because she has a bet on with Bran to see how long it will take Mercy to crack. The answer: not long.]]
* AnimalEyes: A werewolf whose wolf is ascendant (most often due to being close to changing due to the moon or from strong emotion) will have wolf eyes in their human face.

* ArbitrarySkepticism: Werewolves have recently gone public; the fae have been officially out for a decade or so, but the protagonist has to spend some time explaining to people that vampires are also real, her ability to see ghosts is frequently disbelieved, and by the sixth book, someone who has relatives who shapeshift doesn't believe that Mercy can do so too. There is much LampshadeHanging.

* BigotWithABadge: Les Heuter is an agent of Cantrip, a government policing agency in charge of monitoring supernaturals in America. He's also a monstrous SerialKiller and SerialRapist who targets fae and werewolf women out of a mix of sadism, lust and bigotry.

* BerserkButton: Mercy is one for a lot of people - Adam, Samuel, Bran, Zee, even ''Stefan''. Hurt her and you might as well slit your own throat. It'll be a lot cleaner than what the aforementioned people will do to you.
** In ''River Marked'', Uncle Mike decides to report the death of five minor fae (who made the mistake of trying to kill Mercy in front of Adam) as “suicide by werewolf.”

** Like Beauclaire above, Tad is this for Siebold Adelbertsmiter AKA: Zee, or [[spoiler:the Darksmith of Drontheim]].

** Being a werewolf, to a large degree. Yeah, you’re nearly indestructible, functionally immortal, and capable of changing into an uber-wolf at will. However, you’re going to outlive every vanilla human you love (and attempting to turn them is much more likely to kill them or get them killed), the change is agonizing and can take up to a quarter of an hour, and you’ll spend the rest of your life struggling to control the bestial personality sharing space inside your head. [[ArsonMurderAndJaywalking Oh, and you can’t swim.]]
** Also, female werewolves can't have children as the fetuses can't survive their mothers' monthly change into wolf form. Male werewolves can engender children with human women, but only the fully human fetuses are able to come to term.

* ButtMonkey: It's sad to admit, but Mercy herself pretty much falls under this. The number of times she ends up hurt, injured, kidnapped, and more are endless. It's played straight for the most part however, but Mercy always ends up on the short end of the stick. It's made worse since she lacks the healing factor that the werewolves have.

** [[spoiler:Revealed to not quite be true both in passing and in actual actions. The fae ''can'' break their word or tell lies, but they are forbidden from doing so, and the punishment for such transgression is death. Nimue, who appears in the second Alpha & Omega book and is both a Gray Lord and the Lady of the Lake, but that didn't stop a target being placed upon her head for breaking her word.]]

** Odder still is the fact that, despite having a CoolHouse, Kyle spends most of his time living with Warren.
* CreepyChild
** Wulfe (a.k.a. [[RedBaron "The Wizard"]]) is the vampires' creepy child.
** Yo-Yo Girl is the fae's creepy child.
** Later books introduce [[PlayingWithFire Aiden]], a centuries-old human child who was trapped [[LandOfFaerie Underhill]] for most of that time, and Tilly [[spoiler:(a.k.a. ([[GeniusLoci Underhill itself]]'')]].

* CursedWithAwesome: Many werewolves end up feeling this way about the change. Sure, you get temper and territoriality issues, but you also get superhuman strength, a HealingFactor, and near-immortality. Many consider it more than a fair trade, which is why a number of people volunteer to be attacked in order to try to become werewolves themselves. Many don't survive, however.

** In one book a werewolf talks his father into getting turned to save him from cancer. It ''does'' cure the disease, but the father fears and refuses to accept his werewolf side, leading to his Alpha killing him to protect the pack.

** Essentially the basis for ''Wild Sign'', where they investigate a small commune of [[spoiler:white witches]] who made a compact with a being called the Singer. The locals thought that it was a fairy and bound to the letter of their agreement. [[spoiler:Instead, it was a ''god'' and was ''royally pissed off'' by their attempt to violate the spirit of their agreement.]] What happened next was horrifying, even to Charles and the other werewolves.

* DyingRace: Walkers like Mercy are extremely rare, as they and other Native American magical beings went into decline along with the cultures that believed in them. [[spoiler:Also, vampires wiped them out whenever they could find them, as walkers' ability to see ghosts also allows them to locate vampire lairs by day.]]

** The singer is a direct homage to this trope, as it is a nature spirit "becoming" something else and assumes the form of [[spoiler:Cthulhu.]]

* EternalLove: Any long-lived werewolf pair could count, but also [[spoiler:Sam and Ariana]].

* FriendlyNeighborhoodVampire: Stefan at least approaches this. [[spoiler:Though it takes a beating after his HeroicBSOD, following the destruction of most of his menagerie.]]

* GeniusBruiser: Darryl is this in spades. He’s Adam’s second, fought Warren to a standstill, and looks like a big scary African-American/Asian dude. He’s also got a Ph.D, and teaches at the local college.

** A lot of the werewolves do this, because many come from an era where cursing was quite the faux pas.

** Additionally, as Coyote is an adaptive Great Spirit, who breaks the rules as he sees fit, Mercy is shown to be able to do the same. [[spoiler:For starters, not being a werewolf should have made joining a werewolf pack impossible in the first place. Even after joining the pack anyways, she's also able to use pack bonds in an irregular fashion, such as using them to draw the silver out of her pack through her husband to the point that it manifests as pure undiluted silver, rather than the silver nitrate which has been used on the pack. This doesn't come without drawbacks, of course.]]

*** Anna's Omega abilities are shown to be improving as time goes on: [[spoiler:in Dead Heat she accidentally lets off such an aura of calm through her abilities that she reduces her husband, the Salt River Pack Alpha, and a newly-minted wolf into a drunken stupor of joy and giggle fits.]]

** Walkers like Mercy are the result of human/[[spoiler:Native American spirit]] relations. In Mercy's case, her mother is a human and her father is [[spoiler: [[NativeAmericanMythology Coyote]]]].

* LogicalWeakness: In ''Iron Kissed'', Tim uses the Druid's Hide to keep himself protected from any enemy. [[spoiler: He ends up killed by Mercy, who he had forced into becoming his love slave]].

* LoveTriangle: Mercy in the middle with Adam and Samuel on the other two corners. [[spoiler:Possibly a Love Quadrangle given Stefan seems very attached to Mercy as well — attached enough that he protected her from the seethe and chose her over his Mistress. Stefan's attraction for her more or less confirmed in "Night Broken".]]

* MagicalNativeAmerican: Mercy and Charles, somewhat literally. Mercy is a part-Native American shapeshifter, while Charles is a half-Salish werewolf. Hell, Charles can talk to spirits, he just finds it distracting.
** There's two more walkers, a couple medicine men, and [[spoiler:the incarnations of Coyote and Thunderbird]] in ''River Marked'', to boot.
* ManlyGay: If a werewolf who spent the Wild West years as a cowboy isn't tough and muscular enough for you, nothing is.

* MonsterMash: Werewolves, vampires, various types of Fae, witches, Native American monsters...

* ANaziByAnyOtherName: Cantrip seems to be going this way since its members openly talk about wanting to kill all the werewolves and may have arranged a bombing attempt on a fairy reservation.
** Averted in ''Dead Heat'' by the Cantrip Agents Jim Marsden and his partner the half-fae Hollister Leeds, who are decent and hardworking a far cry from the [[spoiler:late and un-lamented Agent Les Hueter]].

* NoodleIncident: Mercy had a history as a child and teenager of playing pranks on Bran whenever she was annoyed at him for something. The stories of how she peanut buttered his pants, wrapped his brand new and very expensive car around a tree, and stole his wife's shoes have all been told. What she did that involved a chocolate Easter Bunny has not. ''Soul Taken'' finally reveals what she did: [[spoiler:she'd given chocolate Easter Bunnies that had been [[LaxativePrank laced with powerful laxatives]] to werewolves who'd been mean to her. She doesn't like to talk about it because after she'd done so she'd realized that any laxative powerful enough to incapacitate a werewolf would have been life-threatening to a human and she was therefore very lucky that all of her targets ate the chocolate themselves instead of, for example, sharing it with a human kid]].

* OlderThanTheyLook / ReallySevenHundredYearsOld: Werewolves and vampires don’t age. Among the wolves, notable examples are Bran and his eldest son Samuel, who were both born before Christianity reached Wales (mention goes to Bran for looking like he hasn’t reached his mid-twenties yet). Among the vampires, Wulfe is noted as looking like he's 15, but being actually one of the oldest ones alive.

** Some ghosts can function in semblance of life, but only up to a point.

* OurVampiresAreDifferent: Vampires become weak if they don't drink blood every once in a while. Most vampires keep a "flock" of humans at their house to feed on. They can avoid killing if they want to, but of the vampires we've seen, only [[FriendlyNeighborhoodVampire Stefan]] really makes an effort to do so. Being a vampire's "sheep" has fringe benefits — it extends your natural lifespan, and gives you resistance to blood-borne diseases like HIV or leukemia. Vampires are dead during the day (but they don't need to return to their original coffin — at one point, Stefan spends the day in Mercy's closet), but come back to unlife at night. They can be killed by the standard methods, but the best one is fire. Beyond that, the circumstances under which any particular vampire is created can sometimes provide them with unique abilities shared by few, if any, of their own kind.
* OurWerewolvesAreDifferent: Werewolves can change shape more or less at will, but changes may be spurred on by strong emotion, and they are forced to change under a full moon. They’re also immune to disease, old age, and poisons. The initial conversion from human to werewolf reverts physical age to mid-twenties or thirties, and most werewolves are somewhere between physically fit and musclebound. Silver is poisonous to them, and more unusually, they can't swim, or only very badly. (They’ve got so much raw muscle mass, they become too dense to float.) The change is agonizing, and changing from wolf to human takes several minutes. They also have minor WeirdnessCensor powers that encourage {{Muggle}}s to mistake them for dogs, even though they're larger than wolves and have odd anatomy for canids. It won't fool someone who already knows about werewolves and expects to see one, and an actual angry werewolf is too different and dangerous to fool anyone, but a werewolf that's stuck in wolf form but otherwise in control of himself can blend in by just having someone put a collar on him. Werewolves can stay in wolf form for weeks or months at a time, but typically lose control long before then. Last but not least, a single bite won’t Change you — only being savaged to the point where you either become a werewolf (and gain super healing) or die.

** Witches in the past formed covens that could number in the dozens of bloodlines, but many of those were destroyed in UsefulNotes/TheSpanishInquisition. Organized witchcraft still hasn't really recovered from the widespread destruction of so many of its elite practitioners by the time the books take place.

** Averted with Mercy -- as a walker, switching between coyote and human is painless and nearly instantaneous. Charles, who inherited some powers from his Native American mother, still feels pain when he shifts, but his transformations are much faster and smoother than normal.

* RagtagBunchOfMisfits: In Silence Fallen, Adam forms a group to go Europe to save the kidnapped Mercy. In the group is Stefan Uccello, Marsilia, Honey Jorgenson, Elizaveta Arkadyevna, Larry Sethaway the Goblin King, “newcomer” Matt Smith [[spoiler: Actually Bran HiddenInPlainSight]] and eventually joined by [[spoiler: Bonarata himself.]]

* ResurrectedMurderer: Cory Littleton started off as wicked killer of innocents even when he was human. Cory was eventually transformed into a vampire and as a member of the undead he now has taken to escalating his killing spree across the city.

* SarcasticConfession: Used by Mercy to explain injuries to a friend.

* SceneryPorn: Not usually Briggs’ stock in trade... but in ''Cry Wolf'', she does a damn good job of painting the wilds of Montana as a beautiful, if inhospitable, place.

* SixthRangerTraitor: Subverted in ''Burn Bright'', when [[spoiler:Leah]] is set up to look like [[spoiler:she's]] betrayed the pack. [[spoiler:She's innocent. [[DoubleSubversion It's actually Sage]], another character who hasn't had any screen-time before that novel, who's the real traitor]].

* SpreeKiller: [[EvilSorcerer Cory Littleton]] of the novel "Blood Bound", is an unconventional supernatural version. Starting off as an evil and psychopathic killer in Chicago, after gaining powers and being accidentally freed from the control of his vampiric Sire, Littleton massacred all of the inhabitants of a motel (4 people in all) and had one tortured to death as well. He then spread a HatePlague across the entire Tri cities, Washington area, which induces rage in the hope of causing people to fight each other to the death, racking up his body count into the dozens.

* SuperDrowningSkills: Since werewolves are pretty much solid muscle, they tend to sink like rocks. This makes it a favored suicide method among old werewolves who don't want to die fighting.

** Fae can use glamour to look like whatever they want. Often, it's the most normal-looking ones that are the most dangerous.

** The Columbia Basin Pack [[labelnote:Note]] Save for Adam, Warren, Ben, Honey, Peter and to some extent Darryl who love and care for Mercy, or at least respect her enough to be part of the group [[/labelnote]] is always this toward Mercy. No matter how many times Mercy has stood up for the pack or put her body and life on the line, the pack just refuse to accept her as Adam’s mate or as a pack member, often blaming her for their troubles or ridiculing her. It gets worse in ''Night Broken'' when most of the pack takes Christy’s side and show they prefer her over Mercy. The situation got so bad, that Adam finally addressed the issue in ''Fire Touched'' by promising to kill anyone who disrespects Mercy again.

* TheWarlord: A Vietnamese Werewolf warlord was responsible for turning Adam into a werewolf. During the Vietnam War, the Warlord took advantage of the chaos, using his powers to carve out a fiefdom which he ruled as as a vicious tyrant. Not knowing what he was, Adam sent his squad in to eliminate the warlord. All of them were slaughtered, save Adam and David Christiansen, who the warlord turned with the expectation that they'd serve him. However, Adam proved [[HeroicWillPower strong willed]] enough to resist his control, instead using his new powers to kill the warlord and avenge his murdered comrades.

* YouNeedToGetLaid: In ''Soul Taken'', Mercy comments that Mary Jo, the member of the Columbia River Pack that she's had the most trouble with, has become much nicer ever since getting a boyfriend. They're still not friends, but Mercy's happy that Mary Jo is no longer sniping at her or attempting to undermine her anymore.

** The Columbia Basin Pack [[labelnote:Note]] Save for Adam, Warren, Ben, and Honey, who love and care for Mercy, or at least respect her enough to be part of the group [[/labelnote]] is always this toward Mercy. No matter how many times Mercy has stood up for the pack or put her body and life on the line, the pack just refuse to accept her as Adam’s mate or as a pack member, often blaming her for their troubles or ridiculing her. It gets worse in ''Night Broken'' when most of the pack takes Christy’s side and show they prefer her over Mercy. The situation got so bad, that Adam finally addressed the issue in ''Fire Touched'' by promising to kill anyone who disrespects Mercy again.

** Adam is particularly adverse to swearing around women - Mercy considers it a personal triumph when she can drive him to slip up and actually swear around her.

* OurWitchesAreDifferent: Witches are magic-users who have power over body and mind (which differs from other magic users like wizards, who have power over objects). Witches gain power through sacrifice; the manner of the sacrifice (and what precisely is ''being'' sacrificed) gives rise to the two main varieties:
** Black witches gain their powers from inflicting pain and death on others and are considered AlwaysChaoticEvil. Black witches often consume white witches to become more powerful.
** White witches are witches that don't gain their powers through harming others. They are generally more innocent and good-hearted spellcasters, but are also often weaker than black witches. There are exceptions, however -- one particularly powerful white witch is so at least partially because she [[EyeScream essentially burned out her own eye using magic]].
** Witches in the past formed covens that could number in the dozens, but many of those were destroyed in UsefulNotes/TheSpanishInquisition. Organized witchcraft still hasn't really recovered from the widespread destruction of so many of its elite practitioners.

* PrematureEmpowerment: Common practice in UrbanFantasy stories, most notably those dealing with [[WolfMan werewolves]], [[VampireTropes vampires]], or other [[ViralTransformation infectious paranormal]]. These books feature a number of characters to whom this happened, for example.

* SexyPackaging: Reading the books in public can be uncomfortable, since the US covers tend to over-sexualize Mercy, showing her dressed a lot more provocatively than she is in the actual text. The UK covers are not nearly as bad. For example, the U.S. cover of ''Blood Bound'' shows Mercy in her mechanic's coveralls - but she wears them [[NavelDeepNeckline unbuttoned to her navel]] and with just a bra underneath. Needless to say, Mercy would never dress in such an impractical way while working on a car.

** The Emerald Basin Pack [[labelnote:Note]] Save for Adam, Warren, Ben, and Honey, who love and care for Mercy, or at least respect her enough to be part of the group [[/labelnote]] is always this toward Mercy. No matter how many times Mercy has stood up for the pack or put her body and life on the line, the pack just refuse to accept her as Adam’s mate or as a pack member, often blaming her for their troubles or ridiculing her. It gets worse in ''Night Broken'' when most of the pack takes Christy’s side and show they prefer her over Mercy. The situation got so bad, that Adam finally addressed the issue in ''Fire Touched'' by promising to kill anyone who disrespects Mercy again.
** But the one person who fits this trope is Mary Joe. In Bone Crossed, Mary Joe was killed and Mercy pleaded with Baba Yaga to revive Mary Joe to life. Baba Yaga gives in and Mary Joe was healed and brought back to life thanks to Mercy. So how does Mary Joe thank Mercy? [[spoiler:In Silver Bourne, she tries to kill Mercy by blowing up her home, which almost got Adam killed instead and by joining a group in the Pack that was trying to overthrow Adam. All because Mary Joe was jealous that Mercy was chosen as Adam’s mate instead of her. Even Mercy brings up the fact she saved Mary Joe's life, but Mary Joe just brushes it off.]] This action has caused Mary Jo to become a near-universal [[TheScrappy scrappy]] for many readers.
** Even Mercy was a bit of this toward Ben after ''Moon Called''. Ben saved Mercy and Adam’s life at the climax of ''Moon Called'', even took a few shots for them. Yet, Mercy still thought very low of him at the end of the book and the following ''Blood Bound''. But it’s very heartwarmingly subverted in ''Iron Kissed'' when Ben stood up for Mercy and talked some sense into Adam over their feelings for each other. Mercy afterwards began to warm up to Ben, even personally requesting him to escort her. Since then, she trusts Ben as a loyal member of the pack.

-->''"Deine Mutter war ein Cola-Automat!"''[[note|Translation]] "Your mother was a Coke machine!" [[/note]]

* AnimalEyes

* ArtisticLicenseBiology: Wolf packs in real life more closely resemble extended nuclear families than competition-enforced hierarchies. The "alpha" wolves in a pack are the parents, and the other wolves are their pups from the last few years. Actual fights between pack members are rare, with pups grown to adulthood dispersing to form their own packs rather than challenging their parents. However, the book does make it clear that werewolf behavior does not exactly parallel wild wolf behavior. (Artificial wolf packs from random wolfs like at zoos however...)

* BadassFamily: All of the Cornicks—even Anna, who’s only a Cornick by marriage.

* BeethovenWasAnAlienSpy: rather, [[LooksLikeOrlok Max Schreck]] was (still is?) an actual vampire.

** Lizzie Beauclaire is very much so for her father the [[spoiler:Gray Lord Alistair Beauclaire aka Gwyn ap Lugh as shown when he calmly murders her attacker the serial killer/rapist/senator's son Les Heuter on national television]].

** Like Beauclaire above Tad is this for Siebold Adelbertsmiter AKA: Zee, or [[spoiler:the Darksmith of Drontheim]]

** mentioned in "Homecoming" when Mercy is cornered and about to be killed by werewolves.
--> Mercy: "When the Marrok come looking for me. Tell him I went down swinging.

** Also, female werewolves can't have children as the fetuses can't survive their mothers' monthly change into wolf form.
** Being a White Witch can be a pain, since they're usually very weak and easy prey for less scrupulous Black Witches who see them as an easy meal.
** Being part-fairy since the vast majority of them are ostracized by both their non-human and human parents and both their respective races, coupled with a high rate of defects, and are also seen as easy prey for their full fey brethren.
* BrainlessBeauty: Subverted: Honey, one of Adam’s pack members, seems like this—blond, busty, and not too bright—right up until the point that she clues Mercy into some important points of werewolf politics that had slipped her notice. To boot, Mercy remarks that if she were allowed to hold her own rank in the pack (rather than inheriting her mate’s, as all female werewolves do), Honey would be in the top tier.

* BuryYourGays: Discussed. The strongly patriarchal werewolf society is instinctively homophobic, and most homosexual werewolves don't survive for long. Warren is a rare and obvious example, having survived thanks to a combination of physical and psychological strength. During ''Moon Called'', it is said that he can't reveal himself as a werewolf to his boyfriend, or the two of them will be killed. Thankfully for them, Mercy [[TakeAThirdOption takes a third option]] [[spoiler:([[TheChessmaster which both Adam and Bran were actually waiting for her to take]])]].

** [[spoiler:Revealed to not quite be true both in passing and in actual actions. The fae can break their word or tell lies technically, but they are forbidden from doing so. Nimue who appears in the second Alpha & Omega book is both a greylord and the lady of the lake, but that didn't stop a target being placed upon her head for breaking her word.]]
* ChildEater: The comic series "Hopecross Jilly" introduces the titular Fae who craved naughty children in particular. While she wouldn't eat naughty children whole, she would eat only their fingers and toes because it was "the parts that got them into mischief to begin with."

* ChekhovsSkill: Mercy's ability to [[ISeeDeadPeople see ghosts]].

* CombatPragmatist: All of the werewolves, for the most part, but Mercy to an even greater degree. In ''Moon Called'' it takes the werewolf member of a trio of trained mercenaries to restrain her completely.
** Although it should be noted that they were trying to NOT harm her, while she was out for blood!
** Also exemplified when Mercy silences a wolf about to take advantage of a weakened Adam…by shooting him in the throat.
* CoolHouse: As an extremely successful divorce lawyer, it's only natural that Kyle owns a BigFancyHouse. But he takes it to the next level by turning into a safe haven for (soon-to-be) single mothers - with lavish creature comforts, numerous safes, a bleeding-edge security system (in addition to Warren, his werewolf lover), and a fair number of secret passages (just in case).

** The Wizard is the vampires' creepy child.

* CompellingVoice: Sufficiently powerful werewolves tend to possess one of these, at least to their pack. Adam and Samuel exhibit a combined one at the climax of ''Moon Called,'' while Dana Shea tries to use one in ''Hunting Grounds''—only to be countered by [[spoiler:Anna’s]] instinctive use of her own.
** Mercy has one in later books [[spoiler:because she's borrowing Adam's]].
* CurbStompBattle: Also many, though the River Devil [[spoiler:slaughtering Coyote and his kin]] is a memorable example.

* CurseThatCures: In one book a werewolf talks his father into getting infected, to save him from cancer. It does cure the disease, but the father fears and cannot control his werewolf side, leading to his Alpha killing him to protect the pack.

** Anna often ends up in this position as well, though like Mercy, she’s hardly defenseless.
** Subverted in Frost Burned. Adam and the entire pack get captured, and Mercy's the one left active. [[spoiler:Then it's averted when Adam frees himself (with help) and slaughters their captors single-handedly.]]
* DaylightHorror: Vampires are no less scary during the day—especially the ones who are powerful enough to stay awake while the sun is up.
** Werewolves also qualify, as they can shapeshift at any time.
* DealWithTheDevil: The community of Wild Sign thinks they're getting the better of a fairy spirit by making one with it [[spoiler: to have its children in exchange for protection from black witches but use magical birth control to prevent them from conceiving. Becomes EvilIsNotAToy when they are subject to his horrifying revenge.]]

* {{Determinator}}: Mercy. Especially at the climax of ''River Marked.'' By the end, the only thing keeping her upright (and not screaming) is willpower.
** Mentioned but not shown is a girl who became a werewolf at age ten. Girls rarely survive the Change to begin with-- Mercy, Honey and even Bran note that a ''ten-year-old'' girl surviving must have willpower to spare.

** In the comic "Hopecross Jilly", the titular fae attacks and devours the fingers and toes of children who behave badly. If that isn't bad enough, she then buries them alive (while still missing their parts) and dances over their burial ground. Yikes. Hopecross Jilly also ends up HoistByHerOwnPetard by this, as she keeps trying to find a reason to go after Adam's daughter Jesse and ends up burned to death as even by Medieval standards of children's behavior (and the Fae), Jesse is a good girl.
** Essentially the basis for ''Wild Sign'' where they investigate a small commune of [[spoiler: white witches]] who made a compact with a being called the Singer. The locals thought that it was a fairy and bound to the letter of their agreement. [[spoiler: Instead, it was a ''god'' and royally pissed off by their attempt to violate the spirit of their agrement.]] What happened next was horrifying even to Charles and the other werewolves.
* TheDogBitesBack: in ''Frost Burned'', the mercenaries hired to kidnap and hold Adam and his pack realize that their employers are okay with letting them die or killing them if they get captured. They promptly decide to cut their losses and flee, but not before giving Adam some useful information and a way to escape.

* DominoRevelation: First we learn that werewolves, walkers and vampires exist. Then came sorcerers, demons, and fairies.

* DidYouJustFlipOffCthulhu: Mercy as a child and teenager was prone to pranking Bran whenever he did something that made her angry. Bran is the leader of all werewolves, among the most powerful individuals of any species alive, and has a legendary bad temper to boot. Everyone else in the town was in awe of her, because if anyone else in the world had tried doing half of what she did, he'd have killed them.

** Mercy killing [[spoiler:the River Devil with Lugh’s walking stick]] at the end of ''River Marked.''
** Jesse, a fifteen year old girl, [[spoiler:kills Hopecross Jilly -- a centuries old child murdering fae SerialKiller.]]
** Becomes literal when the Singer [[spoiler: assumes the form of Cthulhu in order to fight Charles, Leah, Tag, and Anna. They win with the help of Bran.]]

* EarlyInstallmentWeirdness: An interesting case with the werewolves HealingFactor in the earlier books. Initially, it wasn’t as fast nor as strong and it appeared that it greatly required pack magic for a werewolf to heal instantly. Otherwise, it would take several days and several meals for a werewolf to completely heal all of his or her’s injuries. Even then it was only quicker when they are in wolf form. The later books seemed to abandon this in favor of werewolves healing instantaneously even regrowing lost limbs. It’s especially noticeable with Adam in the earlier books (Moon Called-Silver Borne) where he would be taken out of commission as his healing would take several days, even then he could barely walk in human form after healing vs the later books where he is more or less like ComicBook/{{Wolverine}}.
* EarnYourHappyEnding: Mercy and [[spoiler:Adam]] have a decently happy ending by the conclusion of ''River Marked''...but damn if they haven’t paid for it in blood and pain.

** The [[spoiler:River Devil]], which would eventually be capable of eating ''the entire world.''
** The fae also sort of count both as they come from another plane of being sidelong to ours (Underhill), and their true forms can border on nightmare inducing such as the Doll Maker from ''Dead Heat''.
** The singer is a direct homage to this trope as it is a nature spirit "becoming" something else and assumes the form of [[spoiler: Cthulhu.]]
* EnemyMine: every time Mercy has to work with vampires other than Stefan.

** Similarly, while the fae aren’t above rules-lawyering and have a rather inhuman sense of justice…[[spoiler:the over-the-top injustice at the end of ''Fair Game'' is enough to enrage even them. The consequences are unpleasant.]]
* ExactWords: The fae are bound to these whenever you make an agreement with them. It is thus possible, if difficult, to get the better of them. {{Subverted}} in ''Wild Sign'' where some locals attempt this on a local spirit, thinking that it will prevent them from being punished. [[spoiler: It's a god not a fairy and doesn't work]]. It is pointed out that attempting to trick fairies this way is ''stupid'' anyway because all it does is piss them off and they have many ways of getting revenge.
* TheFairFolk: The fae are not exactly cuddly.

*** And, by the end of ''Fair Game,'' [[spoiler:it's driven the Fae into secession from human society and outright war.]]

* GeniusBruiser: Darryl is this in spades. He’s Adam’s second, fought Warren to a standstill, and looks like a big scary African-American/Asian dude. He’s also got a Ph.D, and teaches at the local college. Lots of the werewolves are this, really.

* GodOfFire: Guayota is the God of Volcanos. He has the power to convert innocents into fiery dog-like monsters under his command.

* GoodIsNotNice: Many of the werewolves showcase—and openly understand—this trope. Bran and Charles Cornick in particular are very aware of the nasty, brutal things they sometimes have to do, to keep the peace and keep people safe.
* GoodStepmother: Mercy is beloved by Jesse, the daughter of her neighbor -- and future husband -- Adam.

* HalfHumanHybrid: Mercy herself, being the daughter of a vanilla human [[spoiler:and Coyote in human form.]] There are also half-breed fae.
* HatePlague: The demon in ''Blood Bound'' starts causing people to become more argumentative and violent just by its very presence. The more naturally inclined a person is to violence it is, the stronger the effect is.

** Additionally, as Coyote is an adaptive Great Spirit, who breaks the rules as he sees fit, Mercy is shown to be able to do the same. [[spoiler:For starters, that she isn't a werewolf should have made joining a werewolf pack impossible, but she's also able to use pack bonds in an irregular fashion, such as using it to draw the silver out of her pack through her husband to the point that it manifests as pure undiluted silver, rather than the silver nitrate which has been used on the pack. This doesn't come without drawbacks, of course.]]
** An Omega’s empathy and peace powers seem like a crappy power to have in a bunch of deadly werewolves--right up until you make a berserker-raging werewolf king lay down and play nice with them.
** Shown to be improving as time goes on, [[spoiler:in Dead Heat she accidentally lets off such an aura of calm through her abilities that she reduces her husband, the Salt River Pack Alpha, and a newly minted wolf into a drunken stupor of joy and giggle fits.]]

** Stefan gets one when his menagerie is destroyed.
* HolyBurnsEvil: Any religious symbol (crucifixes, the Star of David...) up to and including Mercy's lamb necklace (representing "The Lamb of God," and not a regular sheep) can hold off a vampire or some of the nastier Fae, assuming the wielder truly believes in their chosen faith. Mercy is able to inflict a temporary burn on a vampire and make her sheep glow with the power of her faith when necessary.
* ISeeDeadPeople: Mercy can see and talk to ghosts. She thinks it's part and parcel of being a walker [[spoiler:until ''River Marked'']]. [[spoiler:Shown in "Night Broken" that perhaps all coyote walkers can when we meet Gary]]
* InconvenientlyVanishingExoneratingEvidence: Avoided big time in “Iron Kissed.” After Mercy was [[spoiler: raped by Tim,]] Gray Lord Nemane was going to take all the fae items [[spoiler: Tim]] stole along with the mind-wrapping goblet that [[spoiler: Tim tricked Mercy to drink from.]] However, Honey stood up to Nemane and argued that they needed at least the goblet as proof of Mercy’s innocence in the matter. Without it, it just appears as if Mercy just decided to [[spoiler: randomly kill Tim after having “sex”]] in the surveillance videos. After some convincing from Adam and even Samuel, Nemane acquiesced and allowed them to keep it until Mercy was free of all charges.
* InterspeciesRomance: Few female werewolves exist, so most males have human mates. Mercy herself has never actually met another walker [[spoiler:before ''River Marked'']], so her love interests have all been this trope.

** Fae/human romances also exist.

** Walkers like Mercy are the result of human/[[spoiler: Native American spirit]] relations. In Mercy's case, her mother is a human and her father is [[spoiler: [[NativeAmericanMythology Coyote]] ]].

** Darryl qualifies sometimes, too—he protects the pack selflessly, but he can be a real asshole about it.
** Zee can be a curmudgeon to pretty much everyone, but when Mercy asks, he'll bend rules even where the Grey Lords are involved.
* LetMeGetThisStraight: In ''Night Broken'' the Hauptmans' lawyer Jenny does a pretty good recap of the events so far in the book. More impressive is that she manages to discuss [[spoiler:volcano gods]] and such with a completely straight face.

* LovePotion: [[spoiler: Tim]] uses Orfino's Bane to make Mercy fall in love with and have sex with him in ''Iron Kissed''. She [[spoiler: smashes his head with a crowbar when she snaps out of the spell]].
* LoveTriangle: Mercy in the middle with Adam and Samuel on the other two corners. [[spoiler:Possibly a Love Quadrangle given Stefan seems very attached to Mercy as well -- attached enough that he protected her from the seethe and chose her over his Mistress. Stefan's attraction for her more or less confirmed in "Night Broken".]]

* MayflyDecemberRomance: happens to many supernatural creatures with human mates. In particular, Samuel outlived three wives and many of their children. [[spoiler:In ''Hunting Grounds'', Arthur chooses to have his wife assassinated by vampires rather than suffer seeing her die of old age.]]
* MindlinkMates: Werewolf couples are this, though the degree varies.
* MonsterMash: Werewolves, vampires, various types of Fae...

* NamedWeapons: Excalibur shows up, as does Carnwennen (“Little White Hilt”) Both are shown to be exactly as deadly as their legends say.
* NamesToRunAwayFromReallyFast: The Beast of Gevaudan. The Marrok. [[EldritchAbomination The River Devil.]] [[TheFairFolk La Belle Dame Sans Merci.]]

* NoodleIncident: Mercy had a history as a child and teenager of playing pranks on Bran whenever she was annoyed at him for something. The stories of how she peanut buttered his pants, wrapped his brand new and very expensive car around a tree, and stole his wife's shoes have all been told. What she did that involved a chocolate Easter Bunny has not. ''Soul Taken'' finally reveals what she did: [[spoiler: she'd given chocolate Easter Bunnies that had been [[LaxativePrank laced with powerful laxatives]] to werewolves who'd been mean to her. She doesn't like to talk about it because after she'd done so she'd realized that any laxative powerful enough to incapacitate a werewolf would have been life-threatening to a human and she was therefore very lucky that all of her targets ate the chocolate themselves instead of, for example, sharing it with a human kid]].
* NotQuiteDead: played with in ''Wild Sign'', as [[spoiler:the Singer in the Woods survives its battle against the werewolves without the latter knowing. Then Coyote enters the scene, noses around, and finds it hiding in a cave in the form of a fingernail-sized, squid-like creature. Apparently, it tastes like eel.]]
* OlderThanTheyLook / ReallySevenHundredYearsOld: Werewolves and vampires don’t age. Among the wolves, notable examples are Bran and his eldest son Samuel, who were both born before Christianity reached Wales (mention goes to Bran for looking like he hasn’t reached the mid-twenties yet). Among the vampires, Wulfe is noted as looking like he's 15, but being actually one of the oldest ones alive.

** Repeaters just repeat an action -- either the moment of their death, or some action that was very important to them in life.
** Some ghosts can function in semblance of life but to a point.

* OurVampiresAreDifferent: Vampires become weak if they don't drink blood every once in a while. Most vampires keep a "flock" of humans at their house to feed on. They can avoid killing if they want to, but only Stefan really makes an effort to do so. Being a vampire's "sheep" has fringe benefits -- it extends your natural lifespan, and gives you resistance to blood-borne diseases like HIV or leukemia. Vampires are dead during the day (but they don't need to return to their original coffin -- at one point, Stefan spends the day in Mercy's closet), but come back to unlife at night. They can be killed by the standard methods, but the best one is fire. Beyond that, the circumstances under which any particular vampire is created can sometimes provide them with unique abilities shared by few, if any, of their own kind.
* OurWerewolvesAreDifferent: Werewolves can change shape more or less at will, but are forced to do so under a full moon. They’re also immune to disease, old age, and poisons. The initial conversion from human to werewolf reverts physical age to mid-twenties or thirties, and most werewolves are somewhere between physically fit and musclebound. Silver is poisonous to them, and more unusually, they can't swim, or only very badly. (They’ve got so much raw muscle mass, they become too dense to float.) The change is agonizing, and changing from wolf to human takes several minutes. They also have minor WeirdnessCensor powers that encourage {{Muggle}}s to mistake them for dogs, even though they're larger than wolves. It won't fool someone who already knows about werewolves and expects to see one, and an actual angry werewolf is too different and dangerous to fool anyone, but a werewolf that's stuck in wolf form but otherwise in control of himself can blend in just having someone put a collar on him. Werewolves can stay in wolf form for weeks or months at a time, but typically lose control long before then. Last but not least, a single bite won’t Change you--only being savaged to the point where you become a werewolf (and gain super healing) or die.

** It should also be noted that it's made clear in the series that the wolf aspect of a werewolf is a distinctly separate entity, entirely sentient, that exists independent though intertwined with the human half. This is part of what makes them so dangerous - because the wolf half is capable of usurping the human half in certain situations where it feels cornered or enraged.
* OurWitchesAreDifferent: Witches refers to magical users who are able to control magic using their minds and bodies which differs from other magic users like wizards who require objects to cast spells. Witches form their own covens which can in some cases number in the dozens. They come in two distinct varieties:
** Black witches gain their powers from inflicting pain on others and are considered AlwaysChaoticEvil. Black Witches consume white witches to become more powerful.
** White Witches are witches that don't gain their powers through inflicting pain and are more innocent and good-hearted spellcasters.

* PapaWolf: ''Adam'', quite literally. Also, Bran Cornick, the Marrok. Two notable fae that also have those traits are Zee and Alistair Beauclaire

* RapeAsDrama: A villain with mind-control magic is not a good thing. Thankfully, treated with tact and realism.

* SceneryPorn: Not usually Briggs’ stock in trade...but in ''Cry Wolf'' she does a damn good job of painting Montana as a beautiful, if inhospitable, place.

* SelfMadeOrphan: [[spoiler: Tim]] killed both of his parents and lived off his inheritance afterward.
* SequelGoesForeign: Silence Fallen is so far the only book not set in the United States, but in Prague, Czech Republic.
* SerialKiller: At least one appears in every book but for the most prominent we have:

** Travis Heuter and his nephews Les and Benedict are rapists, torturers and killers who prey on werewolf women and fae of any gender. That said, they're not very picky with their victims and will happily kill anyone who gets in their way. One of their victims is even a young boy.

* SexyPackaging: Reading the books in public can be uncomfortable, since the US covers tend to over-sexualize Mercy, showing her dressed a lot more provocatively than she does in the actual text. The UK covers are not nearly as bad. For example, the U.S. cover of ''Blood Bound'' shows Mercy in her mechanic's coveralls - but she wears them [[NavelDeepNeckline unbuttoned to her navel]] and with just a bra underneath. Needless to say, Mercy would never dress in such an impractical way while working on a car.

* SheCleansUpNicely: This is Mercy's opinion of her looks, since she works as a mechanic she typically just wears grubby clothes with no makeup, her hair pinned back, and has oil stains up to her elbows. Other people disagree.

** Anna Cornick too. Her silk is made of [[TheEmpath empathy]] .Her steel is made of backbone and [[spoiler:the ability to call on Charles’ not-inconsequential power]].

* SmallRoleBigImpact: [[spoiler:Alan Fraser, and Gerry Wallace. Mercy's involvement in the first novel could arguably be described as a complete coincidence. Without her connection to Alan she may never have known about the funny business going on, or even been awake around the time that Adam was attacked. Her involvement in the foiling of the overall plot caused her to incur a debt to the vampires, a debt that would lead into the next book (Blood Bound) where she both incurs a further debt with the fae (iron kissed), and slights the seethe (bone crossed). Mercy's life may have been very different had Alan looked elsewhere for work, or if Gerry had simply had more spine.]]
* SpreeKiller: [[EvilSorcerer Cory Littleton]] of the novel "Blood Bound", is an unconventional supernatural version. Starting off as an evil and psychopathic killer in Chicago. After gaining powers and being accidentally freed from the control of his vampiric Sire, Littleton massacred all of the inhabitants of a motel (4 people in all) and had one tortured to death as well. He then spreads a HatePlague across the entire Tri cities, Washington which induces rage in the hope of causing people to fight each other to the death which rackets up his body count into the dozens.

** Moira wears them -- and rightfully so, given that [[spoiler:both of her eyes were used up for magical purposes. [[EyeScream They're not pretty]].]]
** Some of the werewolves will also do this to hide the shift in eye color that signals one's wolf-side coming to the fore.
* SuperDrowningSkills: Since werewolves are pretty much solid muscle, they tend to sink like a stone. This makes it a favorite suicide method among old werewolves who don't want to die fighting.
* TheTrickster: [[spoiler:Coyote]] himself shows up in ''River Marked''. [[note]]Guess we know where Mercy got her healthy lack of respect for authority.[[/note]] His response to Mercy asking how big the monster is? [[spoiler:Throwing her in a river with a prehistoric monster so they can find out. When Adam complained, he said he would have thought of ''something'' to keep her from getting killed.]] Yep. He's a trickster.

** Mercy herself is this to some extent, though more in her past then her present. She seems to have mostly used it to get retribution when her own power as a child and a coyote in a ''werewolf'' pack would not otherwise allow it. However, since Asil states that the story of her [[spoiler:peanut buttering the leather seats of Bran's Porche and consequently his very expensive pants]] reached him all the way in ''Spain'', and even Samuel never figured out how she [[spoiler:stole half of each pair of Leah's shoes without ever getting caught]], she seems capable of fairly high level trickery.

** Also, fae when they’re glamoured.
* ThisMeansWar: [[spoiler:In ''Fair Game'', the son of a United States senator is directly involved in kidnapping the daughter of one of the Gray Lords, torturing her to the point of permanent crippling, and would have added her to [[SerialKiller a long list of murdered victims]]--but he is acquitted, thanks to his defense team playing up the "scariness" of the victims, [[WhatMeasureIsANonhuman who were all supernaturals]]. The girl's father appears outside the courthouse with the Wild Hunt and declares that as this verdict has clearly shown that the United States doesn't consider the fae to be people, the fae are now at war with them. He then [[OffWithHisHead decapitates]] the murderer and orders all fae in the US to retreat into their reservations]].
* TitleDrop: Shows up as the name of a particular object in ''Silver Borne''. Also, in the third book, gremlins like Zee are referred to as “the iron kissed,” and Mercy is said to have been “river marked” by the villain of the same book.

* TrueCompanions: Werewolf packs, which also include any human mates or children.

** Besides vampires, ''Bone Crossed'' has at least one ensorcelled, mostly-aware, decaying body. [[OurZombiesAreDifferent Zombies]], perfectly preserved and undying bodies are mentioned but haven't been shown.

* UndercoverAsLovers: Marsilia and Adam, [[spoiler: on their mission to get Mercy back from Bonarata]], decide to pretend to be in a polyamorous relationship with her. And Stefan. And Honey. It's unclear whether anyone actually bought it.

** The Pack [[labelnote:Note]] Save for Warren, Ben and Honey who either love and care for Mercy or at least respect her enough to be part of the group [[/labelnote]] is always this toward Mercy. No matter how many times Mercy has stood for the pack or put her body and life on the line, The Pack just refuse to accept her even as Adam’s wife. Often blaming her for their troubles or ridiculing her. It gets worse in Night Broken when most of the Pack actually takes Christy’s side and actually show they prefer her over Mercy. The situation got so bad, that Adam finally addressed the issue in Fire Touched by threating to kill whoever disrespects Mercy again.

** Even Mercy was a bit of this toward Ben after Moon Called. Ben saved Mercy and Adam’s life at the climax of Moon Called, even took a few shots for them. Yet, Mercy still thought very low of him at the end of the book and the following Blood Bound. But it’s very heartwarmingly subverted in Iron Kissed when Ben stood up for Mercy and talked some sense into Adam over their feelings for each other. Mercy afterwards began to warm up to Ben, even personally requesting him to escort her. Since then, she trusts Ben as a loyal member of the pack.
** Subverted with Zee in Iron Kissed. Zee is by no means ungrateful to Mercy for trying to prove his innocence for murder. However, he is upset at her because her involvement in his case only got her into deep trouble, [[spoiler:and her eventual rape.]]

* TheUnmasquedWorld: Mostly. The Fae came out about 20 years before the start of the story, making it sort of an AlternateHistory, although they are being far from open with the general public about exactly how much their magic can do. Werewolves come out during the events of the series, and they too are working hard on public relations and spin control. Vampires are still considered to be a myth, but a lot of {{Muggle}} characters have found out or are starting to suspect, and some characters are wondering how and whether vampires could come out.

** Also what [[spoiler:Gwyn ap Lugh aka. Alistair Beauclaire]] unleashes at the end of ''Fair Game.''

* VampireWerewolfLoveTriangle: A somewhat subtle one — Mercy herself might deny its existence but neither of her (prospective) beaus seem to have gotten the memo even by ''Silence Fallen''.

** Mercy has done this quite a few times when in her coyote form in public. Sometimes she will wear a dog collar with Adam’s name on it just in case she is seen around a neighborhood. Blood Bound had a funny scene of Mercy playing fetch with some young boys until her “owner” came to pick her up.

* WhamLine: “Bran is funny about Mercy. If you were that funny about Mercy, I would feel the same way Leah does -- no matter how likable I might find her."- Anna in Burn Bright. [[labelnote:Note]] This line indicated many readers that Bran may in fact have romantic feelings for Mercy.[[/labelnote]]

** Most older creatures, be they fae, wolf, or vampire struggle with this.

* WildWilderness: Mostly avoided in Mercy Thompson books, but in the ''Alpha & Omega'' series Charles and Anna have several adventures in the Montana wilderness.
* WorkingClassWerewolves: Zig-zagged. Most Alpha werewolves tend to be quite well off- their innate desire to lead others tends to translate into having important and high-paying jobs and even if it doesn't they can get tribute from their subordinates. Adam, the Alpha of the Tri-Cities pack, runs his own security company. However, many werewolves still get stuck working menial jobs and struggling to make ends meet. Warren, one of the members of the Tri-Cities pack, worked as a clerk in a convenience store for a long time until his boyfriend (a well-regarded lawyer) got him licensed as a private investigator. Zack, another member of the pack, was working as a dishwasher while living in a cheap motel.

** Hopcross Jilly from the comic book of the same name enjoys killing "naughty" children for petty reasons.
** The MonsterOfTheWeek in ''Dead Heat'' [[spoiler:has been abducting kids for decades, and a a bunch of their mummified corpses are found in its lair.]]

* WrongGenreSavvy: In ''Wild Signs'', a group of white witches make a deal with an ancient being. [[spoiler: They assume that it's a powerful fae of some sort and they'll therefore be safe so long as they [[ExactWords hold up the letter of their bargain]]. Unfortunately for them, it's not fae at all but some sort of Native American spirit that is infuriated over their breaking the spirit of the deal and kills them for it]].
* XanatosGambit: Done by the Grey Lords of the fae in the backstory. Faeries' coming out was an accident as far as the general public knows, but faeries and other supernatural characters are aware that it was ordered (or at least, manipulated into happening) by extremely powerful faerie lords. Coming out resulted in FantasticRacism and getting forced into reservations, so it seems like a very bad thing for faeries as a whole, but over the course of the series, characters have discovered that [[spoiler:the Grey Lords wanted to have high population densities of faeries living together because that would give them access to Underhill again, a MagicalLand which the power of faeries is tied to]].

** In ''Silence Fallen'', this turns out to have been [[spoiler:Bonarata's]] plan all along. [[spoiler:And it turns out that even that was the result of an even deeper gambit by Coyote to get Mercy into Prague]].

* YourMom: Zee tends to get creative when he's cussing out recalcitrant cars: ''"Deine Mutter war ein Cola-Automat!"'' [[spoiler:Translation: "Your mother was a Coke machine!"]]

* SilkHidingSteel: Since Mercy can't directly confront stronger male wolves, she works indirectly by smiling and nodding and misdirecting. (Though it might be a ''bit'' of a stretch to call her a “proper lady.”)

* SpreeKiller: [[EvilSorcerer Cory Littleton]] of the novel "Blood Bound", is an unconventional supernatural version. Starting off as an evil and psychopathic killer in Chicago. After gaining powers and being accidentally freed from the control of his vampiric Sire, Littleton massacred all of the inhabitants of a motel (4 people in all) and had one tortured to death as well. He then spreads a HatePlague across the entire [[TriCountyArea Tri cities]], Washington which induces rage in the hope of causing people to fight each other to the death which rackets up his body count into the dozens.

* AdaptationalVillainy: A small case with Adam’s Pack, namely Darryl and Ben, in the Moon Called comic adaptation. In the main book, they were never given any antagonistic moments and Mercy simply took their conversation at the start of book out of context, something even she felt she might of done. Ultimately proving they were both GoodAllAlong. Although the comic book still continues with this twist, it plays up the RedHerring moments more by giving both men a few [[TraitorShot Traitor Shots]] and making them slightly more antagonistic like Darryl threatening Warren and Mercy still distrusting Ben until he saves her life in the climax. Very likely to trick newcomers of the series.

* DeadpanSnarker: While many characters qualify (Mercy, Mary Jo, and even Stefan), Ben really takes the cake! Although he's British (a transplant from the London pack under dubious circumstances), he doesn't quite qualify as TheMeanBrit.