Review: The Alpha's Weave (Pack Born #1) by C.M. Torrens

After years of abuse in his old shifter pack, Dante found a new life with Alpha Victor. He would do anything for Victor. Anything but stay away from Jesse, the half-blood stray. But when Victor names Dante his heir, he has no choice but to accept the duties given to him even if it means relinquishing the possibility of love. He owes his life and sanity to Victor, and that’s a debt Dante can never fully repay.

But Dante should have known the good life couldn’t last. His former alpha, Caster, is not a male who lets anything of value slip through his grasp. When rumors fly of Caster’s return, Dante knows the man will stop at nothing to possess him and his talent once again. When Jesse is kidnapped and Victor falls victim to an untimely death, his worst fears are realized. His old alpha has finally returned to reclaim him. Dante must use his fears and nightmares to save Jesse and his pack, even if it means sacrificing himself.

Sometimes a book from a new to you author works and sometimes it doesn’t. With me this book falls in the latter.

I think part of my frustration belongs to me and not the book. I forgot that books under the DSP Publication are not romance and for me, shifters equal romance. That is not what I got. Though Dante and Jesse from the first pages allude to their forbidden love, it was not something that was at the front of the story and I kept wanting it to happen.

All that aside, there was a lot going on in this story and not just the four POV’s that we get. I normally don’t have a problem with world building but this made me do the Scooby Doo held tilt trying to figure out the pack laws and politics and the whole pack weave deal went way over my head. This shifter tale was odd and nothing like I have ever read before and where usually that excites me, with this it completely took me out of the story.

I’ll keep this review short: Dante used to belong to Caster who was a dick. He escapes Caster and joins Alpha Victor’s pack. Victor’s pack is very touchy feely with one another, taking showers together, bathing one another and they all snuggle in one extra-large even too big for Shaq pack bed. But none of this is romantic or sexual or even capable of giving me feelings. I don’t know what the point was to show all of that and do it all in human form. I love the cuddling etc with shifters when in animal form and find it super swoony and adorable but this was just all kinda weird.

Anyway.

Dante meets Jesse who is a “stray” or half-breed and Victor who seems to be this strong but empathetic Alpha won’t take them in or let one of his dudes be with one. Mmm… Okay? So Dante tries to stay away from Jesse and Jesse is trying to get some help for his sick sister all while helping another stray who happens to be the daughter of Dante’s pack… phew. Yeah. Jesse is also getting help from the wrong wolves and one who happens to be Dante’s real brother August who is a dick like Caster.

Wow.

Like I said, a lot was going on and that was all in the like first 35% of the book.

Things for me never got clearer and never got interesting. I never connected to a single character in the story and found the writing to be pretty pedestrian. The dialogue was stilted, reading with little to no emotion and bored the holy heck out of me and the end was quite literally, anti-climactic.

So yeah. This one, didn’t work for me at all.

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