Tag Archives: shifters

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Book Review: Luna Wolf, by G. Bailey & Regan Rosewood

I accepted a review copy of G. Bailey and Regan Rosewood’s Luna Wolf through Love Books Tours.

Luna-Wolf-Kindle (1)I’ve been rejected by everyone—but an alpha heir wants me to be his pretend mate.

As the only wolf shifter in my pack not to shift, being rejected from my home when I turned eighteen was not unexpected when the shifter war is so close. But being sent to a secret academy full of immortal wolf shifters, demons, and teachers with no morals wasn’t something I planned for.

Luna Alpha Academy is for rejects only.

They choose wolves that no one cares about if they go missing and if I can survive long enough to learn the dark magic they teach, I might even be welcome back home as a wolf-witch.

Only catch?

My tutor is a hot shifter asshole who takes what he wants—this time it’s me.

In exchange for extra training, Atlas wants me to pretend to be his.

Every kiss, every possessive touch, every growl to anyone that comes near me only makes me want him more.

But I can’t have him. Not really.

He’s the alpha heir.

I’m a wolf who can’t even shift.

We don’t belong together, and it’s fake. It can’t ever be real.

Dark magic is my future and my only way back to my pack.

my review

I have very middle-of-the-road feelings about this book. Or rather, I liked the book fine, with the exception of a few critical elements, and I’m afraid that if I innumerate them, this review will come across as far more critical than I intend. So, let’s establish up front that I liked the book fine but have a few critiques that shouldn’t nullify the previous statement.

My biggest issue is the inconsistency in the characters, Atlas especially. He literally acts as if Nyx is a huge imposition on one page, and by the next, he’s hitting on her and has had a complete personality transplant. There is literally no transition between his attitude shifts. It was abrupt, unfollowable, and pulled me out of the narrative harshly. (Worse, it happened more than once.)

luna wolf photoMy second issue is how cliched and predictable the plot lines are. The primary immediate villain is a scorned woman fighting over a man—sometimes I want to shake authors and scream in their faces that women really can have motivations that don’t involve men—and the big reveal is seen coming from…well, basically, the beginning. Honestly, it all felt a little too focused on these small-scale dramas instead of the larger end-of-the-world level drama that is sketched out at best.

The writing is mechanically fine, if a little rough around the edges. The over-arching world seems interesting and I think I’d read another in the series. But, again, I’d call this a middle-of-the-road read.

On a totally unrelated note, I’m SO GLAD the book got a new cover. I’ve stumbled across the old one (with the pretty girl on the cover). And it made me seethe. A big deal is made in the book about Nyx being ‘curvy’ (and I do love a plus-sized heroine). That girl on the cover was not. So, I’m glad I don’t have to be irritated about that.


Other Reviews:

The Moon Alpha Series by G. Bailey and Regan Rosewood

Nocturnal Predators Reviews: Luna Wolf, by G. Bailey

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Book Review: Bad Girls Drink Blood, by S.L. Choi

S.L. Choi‘s Bad Girls Drink Blood has been featured over on Sadie’s Spotlight a couple times and, somewhere along the way, I ended up with an ecopy of it. I think I probably won it in one of the giveaways.bad girls drink blood cover
Part sun fae, part blood fae, all abomination.

There is only one hybrid fae in existence, and that dishonor goes to Lane Callaghan.

After a life spent dodging slurs, threats, and assassination attempts, Lane gave her past the one finger salute and ditched her former fae home for good. The detective agency she and her sisters run on the edge of Las Vegas continues to limp along, with Lane doing more debt collecting and intimidating than investigating, but anything to pay the bills. Between working for low-lifes to bring down even lower-lifes, eating cheesy poofs by the bucket, and flirting with the criminally attractive bartender where she conducts business, life is good.

That ends when a routine job goes sideways, leaving Lane with a sack full of stolen sun shards—the source of sun fae power. Without the shards, the sun fae face giving up their magic completely, or risk death if they use their power. Considering they would rather see her dead, good riddance, as far as Lane’s concerned—except her father and adopted sister are sun fae. Lane must choose—return home to save the fae bastards that almost killed her, or let them burn.

my review
I generally enjoyed Bad Girls Drink Blood. I liked that Lane was a strong female lead, despite her personal insecurities. I appreciated her love and loyalty to her family and that, considering two of the three sisters were adopted, it’s very much a found family. Teddy made for a good romantic partner. I especially liked how he supported her without ever trying to stifle her more dangerous tendencies. The world(s) seemed interesting, the plot moved along at a nice clip, and the writing was pretty clean. So, lots of good stuff here.

I did think it was longer than need be—maybe tried to cover too much ground—there were a couple notable inconsistencies, and I felt a little cheated out of the romance. I liked Teddy and Lane, but we didn’t really get to see them falling in love or either one romancing the other. It seemed to have happened prior to the events of the book. As such, I wasn’t overly invested in them as a couple.

However, if there are future books, I’d be up for reading them.

bad girls drink blood photo


Other Reviews:

Review – Bad Girls Drink Blood by S.L. Choi

 

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Book Review: Broken Moon & Blood Moon, by Laken Cane

I borrowed audiobook copies of Broken Moon and Blood Magic, by Laken Cane, through Hoopla.


About the book:

I’m a wolf shifter… who can’t shift.

Twelve years ago, I was hobbled by my alpha, cast out of my pack, and forced into an unfriendly world without any protection.

But I’m not exactly helpless.

Despite being unable to shift, I have talents the others don’t have. I can see the spirits of dead people, for one. And I have a knack for fighting rogue supernaturals.

My ex-alpha will never let me back in, but there’s another alpha in the city.

Something has been killing his wolves, and he wants me to destroy it before it takes another one. He’ll triple my going rate–but that’s not the thing that makes me agree to help him.

He says he can free my wolf.

It’s not possible, but…
What if it is?

I’ll help him, either way. Monster hunting is what I do, and if there’s a monster killing wolves, I will stop it. Because those two warring alphas might believe the city is theirs, but this is my territory.

The city embraced me when the packs wouldn’t have me, and I will protect it–with or without my wolf.

my review

I quite enjoyed this. Those familiar with the urban fantasy genre won’t find too much new here. But those of us who are familiar with the urban fantasy genre generally read it because we enjoy it and don’t mind a little more of the same. And this is my experience with Broken Moon. I recognized all of the elements that it is made of, but I savored them all the same.

I liked Kait. She’s a strong lead. I did occasionally feel like she was just a little too capable, triumphing against great odds when maybe she shouldn’t have been able to. I also felt like Cane stepped away from some of the most important fight scenes—creating a distance in their writing—rather than allow the reader into the thick of it and this removed quite a bit of the tension.

There’s a possible future love interest here. But there is no romance in the book. So, if you like your UF romance free, this is a safe book to pick up.

Sierra Kline also did a nice job with the narration.


audiobook blood magic coverAbout the book:

My new alpha did the impossible. He freed my hobbled wolf.

And though I’ve craved a pack and an alpha since I was a rejected kid, I rebel against being anything less than his equal–even as my wolf worships the very ground he walks on. It makes for an interesting dynamic.

Flung headfirst into the supernaturals’ world, I am no longer a lonely, agonized outcast running from the moon. My power is growing, I have amazing people around me, and the grateful mayor has set me up with an office and a legitimate job.

For a minute, everything is quiet. Too quiet. Even the demon seems to have disappeared. And all that peace is just a little unsettling.

But then a human hires me to go after the vampires–specifically the county master–and my world explodes into chaos.

Good thing I like chaos.

But when the demon returns with a vengeance, the council makes me an offer I don’t want to refuse, and an infamous and scary as hell hunter blows into my life, the peace and quiet starts looking pretty damn good…

my review
I have to admit that, while I still liked this, I didn’t like it quite as much as book one, though it is an arguably more robust book. Kait is definitely coming into her own and strengthening her place in society. But her tendency to be the strongest badass around is also strengthening and eventually, from a reader’s perspective, this becomes redundant. There’s no real tension left if she’s so strong she can easily overcome even the steepest odds.

I also kind of feel like she’s creating a harem. Like book one, there basically isn’t any romance in the book (though you know who she’d choose if there were). But she seems to be collecting useful, powerful men (but only men, with the noted exception of her mother and roommate). And I’m starting to wonder if Cane isn’t falling into the age-old literary trap of creating interesting fictional worlds but still not being able to imagine them full of an equal number of interesting, three-dimensional women as men.

I did feel some of the conclusions were a little anticlimactic—the end of the demon from book one especially. Regardless, if a third book had been available to me through Hoopla, I’d have continued the series (and still might at some future point). I like Kait. I like her found family. I’m interested in how some of the dangling plot lines conclude. And Sierra Kline again did a good job with the audio.

kait silver series photo


Other Reviews:

???? Broken Moon by Laken Cane