Category: Shifters, Weres

In Our Supernatural Spotlight: Forest of Thorns and Claws by JT Hall (giveaway/Riptide Publishing Tour)

Forest of Thorns and Claws by J.T. Hall
Riptide Publishing

Cover by: L.C. Chase

Read an Excerpt/Purchase it at Riptide Publishing

Scattered Thoughts and Rogue Words is happy to host J.T. Hall here today talking about her latest story, Forest of Thorns and Claws.  Welcome, J.T.

✒︎

Hello and welcome to the blog tour for Forest of Thorns and Claws! This M/M shifter (weretiger) romance is a standalone novel set in the rainforests of Indonesia. The book features a lonely veterinarian and wildlife conservationist from the UK, Dr. Donovan McGinnis, who meets a man from the local Sumatran village, Kersen, after rescuing a snared tigress. I hope you’ll read on to learn more about Donovan and Kersen’s adventures.

Also, remember to leave a comment on this post… one lucky winner will get a $15 Riptide gift card!

About Forest of Thorns and Claws

Donovan McGinnis, a veterinarian and conservationist at a research center in Sumatra, is fighting to save the rainforest from poachers and politicians alike. One day he discovers a tigress trapped by a snare, and while treating her injuries, she bites him. He becomes ill with strange symptoms that leave him feverish and dreaming of the jungle and blood.

Kersen and his family are part of the Siluman harimau, a clan of tiger shifters hidden away in a secret village near the rainforest. When Kersen’s sister is caught, he knows he must free her before she infects someone with their magic and reveals their secret.

But Donovan has already been turned, and only time will tell if he can control the tiger within. Kersen must help him, but will the fierce attraction between the pair bring ruin to them all? With the rainforest under threat from outside forces, they may be doomed anyway, unless Kersen and Donovan can find a way to defeat the danger from inside and out.

Now available from Riptide Publishing. 

About J.T. Hall

J.T. Hall has been writing for many years under this name and others, and has appeared in magazines, anthologies, and online books. She earned her BA in creative writing from the University of Arizona, her Master’s in education from Argosy University, and works as an independent technical writer for state and federal programs. In her free time, she volunteers for the LGBT community and is active in the leather scene. She has a teenage daughter and a partner of over ten years. They live in sunny Arizona with three adorably cute dogs, three black cats, and a hamster who loves peanuts.

Connect with J.T.:

Giveaway

To celebrate the release of Forest of Thorns and Claws, one lucky winner will receive a $15 Riptide credit! Leave a comment with your contact info to enter the contest. Entries close at midnight, Eastern time, on May 20, 2017. Contest is NOT restricted to U.S. entries. Thanks for following the tour, and don’t forget to leave your contact info!

An Alisa Audiobook Review: Until Forever Comes​ by Cardeno C and Charlie David (Narrator)

Rating:  4 stars out of 5

 

A sensitive wolf shifter and a vicious vampire challenge history, greed, and the very fabric of their beings in order to stay together until forever comes.

 

Plagued by pain and weakness all his life, Ethan Abbatt is a wolf shifter who can’t shift. Hoping to find an honorable death by joining his pack mates in a vampire attack, Ethan instead learns two things: draining his blood releases his pain and his wolf, and he has a true mate – a vampire named Miguel.

 

Over four centuries old, strong, powerful, and vicious, Miguel Rodriguez walks through life as a shadow, without happiness or affection. When a young shifter tells Miguel they’re true mates, destined to be together, Miguel sends him away. But Ethan is persistent and being together comes so naturally that Miguel can’t resist for long. The challenge is keeping themselves alive so they can stay by each other’s side until forever comes.

 

Ethan has always been an outsider to his pack and in his family.  When he is drawn to Miguel he realizes that he does have a true mate, the one thing he never thought he would have.  Miguel takes a little more convincing but Ethan can be more than stubborn enough.

 

This story is told from Ethan’s point of view so you can feel just how broken he feels with his family and how determined he is to make his home with Miguel.  He packs up everything he can carry so that he can leave his parent’s home to make a life with Miguel knowing that his mating will never be accepted by his pack.  Ethan is such a sweet heart and I felt connected to him throughout the story.  Miguel doesn’t quite understand Ethan’s connection to him but it’s the first time in a long time that he isn’t so hungry that he doesn’t need to drink more than enough for multiple vampires.  Ethan’s illness allows him to feed Miguel despite that shifter blood is usually poisonous to vampires.

 

Charlie David did a good job narrating this story.  I could connect with the characters through the voices and emotions he portrayed.  However, he didn’t seem to stay consistent with Ethan’s voice in the story, I always knew who was talking but his accent fluctuated and changed throughout the story.

 

Cover art is absolutely beautiful and gives a wonderful visual of these two characters together.

 

Sales Links: Audible | Amazon | iTunes

 

Audiobook Details:

Audiobook, 5 hrs 54 min
Published: September 22, 2015 (ebook, 2nd edition, published July, 15 2015)
Edition Language: English

Series: Mates Collection

A VVivacious Review: A New Beginning (Cascade City Pack #1) by Rebecca James

 
Rating: 5 Stars out of 5
 
River and his group of werewolves find themselves in Cascade City after wandering about trying to find a new place for themselves. But things are far from pleasant, for one, they have no place to stay and River’s refusal to accept help from humans could very well spell their downfall.
 
Meanwhile Josiah wants to help rogues once again though he is aware that his mate might be less then open to the idea given how the last time they took in rogues, it ended with them being ousted from their own pack.
 
While Jax, David and Brooks are battling all new problems… Brooks is pregnant and no one knows for sure if the baby is David’s or Jax’s but if that didn’t make things complicated enough, David’s wolf is being obsessively protective of Brooks during his pregnancy to the extent that he perceives Jax as a threat. What will these new developments mean for these three, will they manage to make it through together or will the strain of things make something give way?
 
This book just about killed me with the roller-coaster of emotions it had me on. This book is sooooo good. I mean books in this series truly just seem to get better with each new book. Hats off to the author for doing an excellent job.
 
This book is a sequel to the Third Mate which is the third book in the River Wolf Pack series and you can read this book even if you haven’t read Omega Arrival though that is also one awesome book.
 
The moment I finished this book I wished I could read it again for the first time. It was just so good and gave me the worst book hangover in recent times and urgh… just can’t wait for the next one. I read this book in a single sitting and I think what I loved the most about this book was that it was lengthier than its predecessors which meant that I was going to get extra time with all my favourite characters.
 
This book mostly follows David, Jax, Brooks, River, Josiah and Foster and is also told from the perspective of five of these six characters. I truly believe that the multiple POVs really work for this book because people have different priorities. Particularly in this book River is more concerned with getting the pack on track and David is concerned with Brooks’ pregnancy so when the perspective shift it’s just a new way of looking at the problem while simultaneously giving you another POV and storyline. Also the fact that you get to see all the important things happening in your beloved characters’ life is a definite plus point. There are two scenes in this book where the conversation between Jax and David happens off page and that really irked me out because those conversations were just something that I wanted to know so badly but since the book was at that time being told from River’s perspective I was out of luck, but this also drove home the point that had this book been from a single perspective I would have missed out on so much that was happening in other characters’ lives.
 
This book just has an amazing story to tell. The pack is finding it hard to adjust to the city but just when everything seems down in the dumps, River comes through for his pack. River and Josiah’s storyline in this book is focused on restoring the pack to its former glory. Someone makes this observation about River and Josiah in the book that while they might fight they always find a way to make things right. Also I loved how the author approached the problem of River worrying about the fact that his mate had too much of a sway over his decisions, I mean this was the best way to solve the problem by making River see the truth and realizing that in a way it is awesome that there is someone there to help him and find a way through problems even ones where you wonder if he might be one. I loved how Josiah comes through for River in this book, it was amazing. Their relationship was a bit worrying at the starting of the book given the pressure they were both under but by the end I was simply amazed.
 
Foster has a short story line in this book which wraps up very quickly when he finds his true mate. I really don’t know what the author plans to do with Foster’s character in the future but I for one didn’t mind him being gone all that much for one because that meant he was with his true mate, though I loved how the author handled the goodbyes.
 
Now coming to the very best part of this book which is undoubtedly the relationship between David, Jax and Brooks. I love how the author writes these three and their relationship as something effortless. I loved the implication that Brooks was scared of loving Jax because he knew that while David would never leave him Jax could, which made him guard his heart a little around Jax which made me wonder if that is what Jax did with Brooks as well because the whole reason he wanted David to mate was so that David wouldn’t be alone when Jax left but this isn’t something explicitly stated in this book and that is because this book doesn’t offer Jax’s perspective. I really want a book from his perspective; in fact I need it, considering everything that happens in Jax’s life in this book I really wish the next book in this series would feature him in a starring role. For all I care it could be entirely from his perspective. But while Brooks and Jax are guarding their hearts around each other, David and Jax have kind of already committed to misery when they fell in love with each other fully well knowing that it may someday lead to a world of hurt. I simply loved David and Jax and their relationship in this book. There are two scenes that particularly stand out for me and these were two such amazing scenes, that they took my breath away and then that fact that was revealed in the epilogue seems to promising much more, hopefully. I just can’t wait for the next book because I can’t wait to know where David and Jax’s story is going to go from here.
 
Amazing amazing book. If you have been loving this series this book is one to be devoured and for people who haven’t gotten on the bandwagon yet this series is simply amazing.
 
Cover Art by Written Ink Designs. Love the cover.
Sales Links:  JMS Books LLC | Amazon
Book Details:
ebook, 257 pages
Published April 29th 2017 by JMS Books LLC
Original TitleA New Beginning
ISBN139781634863827
Edition LanguageEnglish
SeriesCascade City Pack #1

A MelanieM Review: Wolf in King’s Clothing by Parker Foye

Rating: 3 stars out of 5

 

An exiled shifter. His alpha mate. And a desire so intense it could be the death of them…

York, England, 1912

Kent was a pack outcast. His shifter instincts cruelly muted, he was collared and kept as a stray. Until he was offered his freedom—for something in return. He must rescue Hadrian, an alpha held hostage in the wolf highlands. It’s a pleasure for Kent to follow the captive’s scent, one so wild and virile it gives him a rush. Though he despises being treated like a mutt called to heel, he’ll gladly fall to his knees for an alpha like Hadrian.

Hadrian has never met anyone like this damaged wolf warrior. His savior who licks the blood from his wounds and who arouses in him feelings he doesn’t understand or want to control. But Hadrian suspects that more than desire binds them. It’s betrayal. Pawns in an elaborate and feral deceit, they’re now caught in the deepening maze of a vengeful shifter world, where navigating the mysteries of the heart could prove just as unpredictable and dangerous as the enemies they face.

I thought Wolf in King’s Clothing by Parker Foye had many terrific elements to it.  Foye’s  writing was able to engage me in Kent’s situation and his need for Hadrian.  In fact, Kent is the best thing about the story.   He’s almost feral, a wild being yet one we are able to connect with.  Foye’s decision to make him a berserker was a good one that plays out against his size and constant state of disorder and more.  We feel compassion for Kent and that allows us to come to his side of the story and remain there.

Hadrian is more of a shadow character, elusive as we don’t have as much background on him and honestly, I didn’t believe in his character as I did Kent’s.  Or the ugly people and beings that surrounded Kent, they were very much alive.

I found it odd that  Foye decided to place his story in York, England, 1912.  There didn’t seem to be any firm reason for that.  This could have been any fantasy world or alternate world, there was nothing or no real reason other than to bring the Titanic into it (and that was sort of absurd).  Anything else, avalanche, earthquake, bomb, could have been used to the same effect…get rid of a bunch of leaders in one place.  Because the reference disappears and you really don’t care when the story is placed again.  It’s merely an oddity and a jarring one at that.

The pathos at the end of the real is real.  It tugged at my heart.  I felt for both characters.  But again, with the good comes the bad.  I was also let down because there was no comeuppance for the person who put Kent through all that.  It was “oh well, that happens”.  I’m all about the revenge here.   Ah well.

As I said, there were some good elements here, enough that overrode the bad that I’m giving it 3 stars.  The writing made me connect to one of the main characters, enough to pull at me at the end when it looked like he was going to die.  I only wish the author had built on the  good elements they had going, and scattered the others away.

 

Cover art is just so so.  Doesn’t speak to the era or  show the interesting characteristics of the MC’s. Could be any book.

Sales Links  

Carina Press – Amazon: CA / COM / UK – Kobo

Book Details:

This book is approximately 32,000 words\ebook

Expected publication: May 15th 2017 by Carina Press
Original TitleWolf in King’s Clothing
ISBN139781488078521
Edition LanguageEnglish

Cardeno C on the Mates series + Giveaway

Scattered Thoughts and Rogue Words is happy to host Cardeno C. today, celebrating the author’s Mate series and a new release in May!

The author is  happy to offer a giveaway for your blog readers –  three randomly chosen winners with each getting one of the books. To be entered to win, leave a comment with an email address where you can be reached if chosen.

Until Forever Comes (Mates, #2) by Cardeno C.


Goodreads Link: https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/25926739-until-forever-comes

Amazon Link: http://www.amazon.com/Until-Forever-Comes-Mates–Collection-ebook/dp/B011STPHA4/

A sensitive wolf shifter and a vicious vampire challenge history, greed, and the very fabric of their beings in order to stay together until forever comes.


Plagued by pain and weakness all his life, Ethan Abbatt is a wolf shifter who can’t shift. Hoping to find an honorable death by joining his pack mates in a vampire attack, Ethan instead

learns two things: draining his blood releases his pain and his wolf, and he has a true mate – a vampire named Miguel.


Over four centuries old, strong, powerful, and vicious, Miguel Rodriguez walks through life as a shadow, without happiness or affection. When a young shifter tells Miguel they’re true mates, destined to be together, Miguel sends him away. But Ethan is persistent and being together comes so naturally that Miguel can’t resist for long. The challenge is keeping themselves alive so they can stay by each other’s side until forever comes.


Word Count: 60,702

 

Wake Me Up Inside (Mates #1) by Cardeno C.


Goodreads Link: https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/25967103-wake-me-up-inside

Amazon Link: http://www.amazon.com/Wake-Me-Inside-Mates–Collection-ebook/dp/B0137I04VQ/


A powerful Alpha wolf shifter and a strong-willed human overcome traditions ingrained over generations and uncover long-buried secrets to fulfill their destiny as true mates.


Regarded as the strongest wolf shifter in generations, Alpha Zev Hassick is surprised and confused by his attraction to his best friend. His very human, very male best friend. A male shifter has to mate with a female shifter to keep his humanity, so shifters can’t be gay. Yet, everything inside Zev tells him Jonah is his true mate.


Maintaining a relationship with the man he has loved since childhood isn’t easy for Jonah Marvel, but he won’t let distance or Zev’s odd family get in their way. When unexplained ailments begin to plague Jonah, he needs to save his own life and sanity in order to have a future with Zev.


Zev and Jonah know they’re destined for each other, but they must overcome traditions ingrained over generations and long-buried secrets to fulfill their destiny.


Word Count: 74,755


In Your Eyes (Mates, #3) by Cardeno C.

Goodreads Link: https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/25927403-in-your-eyes

Amazon Link: http://www.amazon.com/In-Your-Eyes-Mates–Collection-ebook/dp/B011STPGGO/


Two very different men with a tumultuous history must overcome challenges from all sides and see past their society’s rules to realize they are destined for one another.


Raised to become Alpha of the Yafenack pack, Samuel Goodwin dedicates his life to studying shifter laws, strengthening his body, and learning from his father. But despite his best efforts, Samuel can’t relate to people, including those he’s supposed to lead.


When Samuel meets Korban Keller, the son of a neighboring pack’s Alpha, he reacts with emotion instead of intellect for the first time in his life. Resenting the other shifter for throwing him off-balance, Samuel first tries to intimidate Korban and then desperately avoids him. What he can’t do is forget Korban’s warm eyes, easy smile, and happy personality.


When a battle between their fathers ends tragically, Samuel struggles to lead his pack while Korban works to break through Samuel’s emotional barriers. Two very different men with a tumultuous history must overcome challenges from all sides and see past their society’s rules to realize they are destined for one another.


Word Count: 60,875


COMING MAY 4, 2017

To Touch You


“His name is Salvatore Rossi. He’s a vampire. And he’s my true mate.”


By not relying on anyone except himself, Salvatore Rossi escaped a dead-end existence and reached the height of corporate success. But just when he has everything he always wanted, fate throws Salvatore a challenge he can’t solve alone and a young wolf shifter comes to his rescue.

Since childhood, Yoram Smith’s family was certain he would grow to become Alpha and save their beloved pack from its slow demise. When the time comes for a new leader, Yoram is forced to juggle his duty to care for a splintering pack with his duty to care for an absent mate, and his own strength suffers.

Being turned into a vampire didn’t alter Salvatore’s life philosophy: if you don’t rely on anyone, nobody can let you down. But when the boy who saved his life becomes a man who needs his help, the icy vampire must find his humanity.

 

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Heartwarming Stories. Strong Relationships. Forever Love.