Reviewed by Donna
TITLE: Jared
SERIES: Whitedell Pride #11
AUTHOR: Catherine Lievens
PUBLISHER: Extasy Books
LENGTH: 125 Pages
BLURB:
What you are doesn’t determine who you are.
Jared didn’t expect to find his mate, but he is overjoyed when he does, even if Chogan is a wendigo. When Chogan doesn’t recognize Jared as his mate, Jared is hurt and he pushes Chogan away without telling him about the bond between them, thinking it’ll all end there. He hasn’t taken in consideration one of their friends spilling the beans, though.
Chogan is a wendigo and wendigos don’t have mates, and most of all, they don’t have love, so he’s both surprised and elated when he finds out Jared is his. Now that he has a chance at a happily ever after, he’s not going to let Jared go, even if he has no idea where to start.
The two of them work to get over their awkwardness and doubts, but just as they manage to get closer, Chogan’s recent past comes back to get him. He knows the pride will protect him, but can he risk his mate’s life to save his own?
REVIEW:
When I reviewed Soren’s book a couple of months ago I said that he was the last of the original Whitedell shifters who was waiting for their story. How on earth did I forget about Jared?
Jared has been with the Whitedell pride, acting as the shifters’ doctor for about ten years. While all of his friends and fellow shifters began finding their mates, Jared kept himself busy saving the lives of the victims rescued from the scientists’ labs and also working to set up the newly built shifter hospital. It has been a week since his friend Keenan was first kidnapped then rescued, a week since he learnt about the wendigos living in the forest which makes up part of the Whitedell territory. But knowing of their existence and witnessing a violent battle between them, right outside the pride’s gates, are very different things. The last thing he expects when he hurries to aid the wendigo who saved Keenan’s life is to discover his fated mate. Unfortunately for Jared, Wendigos don’t have mates.
Chogan isn’t like other Wendigos. He’s never fit in with the rest of his people, and ever since he aided in Keenan’s escape he knows he’s been living on borrowed time. Thankfully his mother agrees to leave with him and they flee to the pride, hoping to find sanctuary with the shifters there. But he’s followed by the leader’s vicious son, and even after surviving that first fight, Chogan knows the wendigos won’t give up that easily.
I really enjoyed this addition to the series. I’ve read one other book (which was m/f) that had wendigos in it but there were definitely no redeeming qualities to any of them. I love when shifter stories take animals or creatures that are generally only seen as evil and make them into a lovable main character. Chogan was still a big, ugly, scary monster (although, thank god he didn’t smell like the others) but he was a good person beneath that furry grey skin. And I should probably add that Chogan does have a human form, in case you were wondering. There’s no freaky kinky beastly lovin’ happening here. Their sex life doesn’t need any kink to increase the hotness factor. Having read everything that this author has published to date, I feel qualified to say the sex scenes between the characters in her stories continue to get hotter with each new book.
The Shifter Council make a brief appearance in the book and you get the feeling that the story arc with the Glass Research Company may be coming to an end (considering Glass is now sitting in their shifter prison). Hopefully we’ll soon be seeing more of the council, which for the most part has been patiently waiting in the background for its chance to shine.
And speaking of shining… Any fan of this series who is concerned that Keenan might get less page time now that he’s had his story told, nah uh. Keenan is still being his usual superstar self, lecturing recalcitrant shifters on the joys of mating and working his darnedest to get them together.
I’m pretty sure the next book in the series is Troy, which rather ambitiously gives us a harpy, a Krsnik (kind of a shifter cross with a vampire) and introduces mpreg into the mix. On top of that we have Glass’s son on his way to Whitedell to witness the trial of his father, and I can’t help but hope that he finds himself mated to a shifter. Or a nix.
And in case you missed it the first ten times that I said it – this series definitely has to be read in order.
RATING: 
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