GUARDIAN’S MATE (Shifters Unbound #9) by Jennifer Ashley-Review and Giveaway

GUARDIAN’S MATE
Shifters Unbound #9
by Jennifer Ashley
Release Date: September 6, 2016
Genre: adult,contemporary, paranormal, romance

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About the book: Release Date: September 6, 2016

She wasn’t ready to lead…

Chosen as the Guardian of her Montana Shiftertown, wolf Shifter Rae Lyall is facing opposition—for no woman has ever been selected for this powerful position. Still adjusting to the new authority thrust upon her, Rae travels to train with Zander Moncrieff, a Shifter healer, tasked with teaching her about her new role and its responsibilities.

He wasn’t ready to love…

A polar bear Shifter, Zander wears no Collar and follows no rules but his own. Rae finds him arrogant and demanding, yet compelling and intriguing. Zander has no wish to mate but the sassy Guardian is drawing him out of his shell, stirring feelings long suppressed. And when a new threat looms over Rae’s home, she and Zander must race to the rescue, forced closer to danger…and to each other.

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REVIEW: GUARDIAN’S MATE is the ninth full length installment in Jennifer Ashley’s contemporary, adult SHIFTERS UNBOUND paranormal/fantasy romance series. This is polar bear shifter/healer Alexander ‘Zander’ Moncrief, and lupine shifter/Guardian Rae Lyall’s story line GUARDIAN’S MATE can be read as a stand alone without any difficulty but for cohesion and backstory I recommend reading the series in order.

SOME BACKGROUND: Thousands of years in the past, the Fae created the shifters-a cross between beast and man-and in the ensuing time the Fae lost control and power over the creatures they had created. Approximately twenty years ago shifters were exposed to the human population. Out of fear, discrimination and specieism, the shifters were collared with Fae magic in the belief that it would control aggression; then they were forced into segregated communities known as Shiftertowns. There are several Shiftertowns located throughout America where shifters live in a relative but strained peace amongst their own kind.

Told from several third person perspectives GUARDIAN’S MATE focuses on the first female Guardian, chosen by the goddess, and the resulting fall out when the shifters of the Montana Shiftertown don’t take too kindly to a woman in charge. Hoping to protect his daughter from potential harm, Montana Shiftertown leader Eoin Lyall sends Rae to Alaska and reclusive polar bear shifter Alexander Moncrief for training and protection. What ensues is the building relationship between Zander and Rae, and threats against out couple when a vigilante bounty hunter takes aim at everything shifter. A group of feral shifters has targeted both human and shifter populations, and Zander and Rae are caught up in the fight.

Xander Moncrief is a healer imbued with magical, empathic powers that have forced our hero into a reclusive life where the pain and suffering of others is far from his mind. Rae is a young shifter, barely past her transition, and the first woman chosen as the Guardian of her kind. The Guardian is tasked with ‘sending’ their dead to the Summerland-the shifter ‘after life’-but Rae has never been trained to handle the magical sword that is usually passed down from father to son. Xander Moncrief must temper his emotions as it pertains to the feisty lupine Guardian but attraction and the mating frenzy begin to over power our couple even as they are on the run from the people trying to destroy their lives. The romance is very slow to build; the $ex scenes are intimate and provocative.

There is a large ensemble cast of secondary and supporting characters including several shifters we have met in previous story lines, as well as the introduction of lupine shifter Ezra Wilcox, a man whose aging father recently passed away; Miles Keegan, a boat captain who hides a secret from the people with whom he works; Zander’s friend Piotr Ivanov who adds a little bit of humor and fun; and human Carson McCade, a man out to avenge the attack on his wife.

GUARDIAN’S MATE is a story line that follows a new arc for the series focusing on an impending war between the shifters and the Fae. The premise is entertaining; the romance is a bit of push and pull as Zander tries to keep his distance while the couple is on the run; the characters are an eclectic and colorful mix of shifters and humans. GUARDIAN’S MATE is an imaginative tale of adventure, action and romance. If you like paranormal story lines about shifters and their struggle in a world controlled by humans and the Fae, check out Jennifer Ashley’s SHIFTERS UNBOUND series.

Copy supplied by the publisher through Netgalley

Reviewed by Sandy

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