REVIEWED BY CINDY
TITLE: An Unexpected Mating
SERIES: The Melrose Coven 2
AUTHOR: Toby Aden
PUBLISHER: Siren Publishing
LENGTH: 87 Pages
RELEASE DATE: June 12, 2016
Blurb:
Justin Chandler hates shifters. In fact, the one thing he associates with shifter is how fast he can kill them. And fate, the bitch, saw to it that his most hated enemy is his mate, and there’s just no way he can ever accept that.
The one thing Shawn McKay held sacred was the anticipation of his mate. As a werewolf, he’d always dreamed of finding his mate. After meeting Justin at a party, he couldn’t deny the intrigue he felt, knowing full well that he had finally found his mate. What he did not expect was meeting Mike Beckley, another vampire and his other mate.
Mike Beckley is a sweet, caring sometimes-oblivious fashion guru and Justin’s on-again, off-again lover. His job as an interior decorator led him straight to his mates, but, with the animosity between his two mates, what will become of the three men?
Review:
First I’d like to point out that I didn’t know this was part of a series until I received it. That being said, while reading the first one will help explain some of the details, the story between the three men sort of stands on its own.
Those of you who follow my reviews know that I love shifter and vampire stories and snap up as many as I can to read. It’s my favorite genre of books, movies and TV shows and I’m greedy with how many of these stories I go through.
I wanted to love this book. It has all the elements that I love but somehow it’s just not put together in a way that appealed to me.
I had a hard time connecting with these characters. I think the amount of sex in the first couple of chapters threw me off as well. I think the first time between Shawn and Justin was supposed to be hate sex (at least on Justin’s part) but it kind of fell short of the intensity that’s needed to convey that. And the whole “sex will fix everything if we have enough” attitude didn’t make it any better.
I know this is about mates and that usually helps me accept the insta-love in a shifter story but honestly? This time it just left me wanting more. More of a connection between the characters, more reasoning for the attitude shifts that seems to happen “whenever”, especially on Justin’s part.
It kept feeling like the author was skipping ahead over things that the reader needs to know to appreciate how these men work. We never do get to learn very much about Mike and I ended up feeling like he was just thrown in to make it a menage, with no real back story to help us get to know him.
It did get a little better about 3/4 of the way through, when the character’s started to develop some personality and the dialogue improved. This story had the potential to be really great, with an awesome premise and characters I would have like to have gotten to know a little better, and that’s what get’s it the 2.5 stars from me.
Rating: 
Buy Link:
Sirene