I'm not going to be bringing anything new with this review. I will say however that despite this story embodying classic, standard Calmes plotlines and characters (but with different names and settings) it really works well in the paranormal world.

The absurdity and plot holes can easily be explained away with the destined mates trope. Claiming and possessiveness and Logan going alpha on Jin's ass are all acceptable. Spontaneous sex whenever and wherever is absolutely guaranteed, and just lends to the overall yumminess of this preposterous setup. Because really?? Anywhere else this would be a big no-no.

So yes, Calmes is a certain kind of crack. Everyone knows this. And everyone knows that you either love and accept it for what it is, or you know it just isn't for you. Well, the majority of the time it's for me. And it certainly doesn't hurt that this was freakin hot, if a bit overdone (Yes, I put my own self in the corner. For shame!)

My brain is still reeling from all the new words/terms/world building, but in the grand scheme of things, that matters little.

Again - enjoyable, predictable, combustible.

Good fun with Meags as we delved into this craziness! ( )

This book was torture for me. I wanted it to end so much!!

My problem was the writing because the story was decent enough. So many unnecessary dialogues and so little descriptions. But the most frustrating thing was this: (took these literally from the book, didn't changed anything ( )

For some reason, I put of reading this book and I now hate myself for it. It was at medium length and one of the best shifter stories I've read in a long time. Very balanced, just the right amount of sex and a bountiful of feelings. Very-hot rating.

I was impressed by this author using werepanthers because that's not something we see very often. It's almost always vampires/werewolves. Panthers are VERY sexy. Will look for more. ( )

B.A. Tortuga always comes through for me. Dusty, Nate and the other characters were wonderfully developed. The bombings put some suspense and mystery in a beautiful story that highlights the U.S. southwest. There was a depth to the story that kept me turning pages. I loved that both Nate's and Dusty's families knew that the guys were gay. Nate's mother was a hoot. The cover picture is awesome. ( )

Yay libraries!

This was published in 2009. It is surprisingly good for that much earlier in this author's career. If you've ever read her work, you'll recognize the archetypes she most frequently uses. I happen to like or not mind them. YMMV of course.

What impressed me about this story is that every plot escalation comes from the MC's trauma or the worldbuilding, or both. That's excellent. This is why I'll check out the next book.

Where it fails is threefold. The first is where many books with trauma fail, the repetition of denial/refusal supposedly because the MC hasn't worked through his trauma yet, but it could have been handled more gracefully at least half the times, or eliminated. The second is in repeated dialogue as if these people can't remember their last argument. That's an editing problem; writing is a lot slower than reading is, so it's easier to forget what you've done, or conflate different parts of your manuscript. But an editor ought to have caught it. And third, that last chapter cries out for a better edit of its clunky repetitious prose that at that point I read for the gist.

But I enjoyed it, and that's the point. Three solid stars for worldbuilding, the other two for the plot and pair despite the flaws. ( )