Review: Embracing Fate (A Series of Fates #2) by C.C. Dado

A Series of Fates: Book Two

Sometimes you just have to embrace your fate.

Seth has a secret: he has a crush on the human next door. His brilliant plan to meet Jack, the man of his dreams who happens to be an animal trainer? Take wolf form and ask his best friend, Max, to take him next door for training. Seth is the only one surprised when things go horribly awry.

Still, can this shy wolf and a human meet their fate as mates?

The blurb to this book is what made me want to read the series. A shifter who asks his best friend to pretend he’s his DOG so that he can get close to the hot dog trainer who lives next door? Come on! If that doesn’t scream at you that you will have good time I don’t think we can be friends. Kidding. I am not friends with people anyway because I’m a socially awkward introvert but you get it, right?

This was everything I hoped it would be and more. I loved being in Seth’s head as he longs for a mate and bond like his best friend Max with their Alpha Christian. Seth just needs to find his mate and it doesn’t take long when human Jack applies to move to Easter Valley and it’s accepted. Goodness but this was adorable. Have I mentioned that five times already?

This series is quickly becoming a favorite of mine. Each story is short but gives you just enough information that you fall into the story and don’t want to stop reading. Would I have liked a bit more of it? Sure but that’s just me being greedy wanting to share every minute with Jack and Seth from their first meeting, to picnics, movie nights and everything that comes with them being mates. But I liked what I got and can’t complain.

Seth could feel the pull between them. It was like having a secret that you only knew part of. He wondered what it felt like for Jack. If he could even feel the pull at all.

Seth. You shy boy with two colored eyes and bangs that fall in your face. Your plan to have your BFF present you to your mate as a dog/wolf who needs training is right up there with the hijinks of Lucy and Ethel. You and Max crack me up but I loved seeing your wolf with Jack. It’s a favorite thing of mine when a shifter is with a human, that bond between man and animal and you and Jack are perfect together. The leash fits you in both forms and I am so glad that the elders explained your destiny and Jack bonded with both you and your wolf – regardless of the ridiculous names Max gave you – because you and your mate made my day.

Jack! I loved you with you long wavy hair and your love for animals. You didn’t know why you felt the urge to apply to live in a town, jump through all the hoops entailed and why it felt like you finally belonged once you got there. You didn’t know shifters existed or that you would become part of a pact, you just knew that the boy next door was beautiful, shy and unforgettable. You also fell hard for him as a wolf so that made me fall hard for you.

The story has many moments of comedy throughout it but that’s expected when Max is around. You can’t fault the boy for his natural talent to make everyone laugh while they simultaneously want to pull their hair out. Max is something special and when Seth tells a lie to get to see Christian one day, the shenanigans begin because Christian’s Beta starts to treat Max like something to be coveted. I won’t tell you what that is because it’s pretty funny and sweet as honey but I will say it will totally prepare you to fall for Zeus and crave to read his book.

Yup. This was a good one. Just the right amount of everything to make this ginger happy.

A review copy was provided by the publisher in exchange for an honest review.

Review: Renaissance (Village Love #2) by Lillian Francis

Smudge really needs to get laid, if only to stop himself wondering about the softness of Raleigh’s curls and why he keeps running away.

After his tumultuous teenage years, Smudge has settled into his quiet life in the sleepy English village of Slopy Bottom. He’s his own boss with the time and space to indulge his artistic creativity. And he has friends. He’s happy. Satisfied. Lonely. And the pool of potential soulmates is almost non-existent. His friends, Rick and Mal, flush with their own happy romance, keep trying to set him up with the most incompatible men, and he's never finding true love on Grindr. Hell, he's not even going to manage a hook up based on the kinky messages he’s been getting recently. He'll just have to slake his desire to find his own HEA in the pages of bosom-heaving romance novels.

Raleigh is the darling of Slopy Bottom’s blue rinse brigade: church organist, mobile librarian, and apparently wedded to his trademark cardigans. He seems to be the polar opposite of the artistic Smudge, whose brightly coloured mohawk and piercings should be a red flag to Raleigh. Yet he’s yearning for company too. It’s just that Raleigh has less expectation and definitely less courage to chase after it, for reasons that he keeps very close to his chest. Reasons that don’t stop him from being drawn irresistibly to Smudge.

Smudge is sure that the way Raleigh runs from him whenever he sees him is cruelly deliberate. A reflection on his bad boy looks and his disdain for Raleigh’s precious church. So why can’t he stop thinking about the softness of Raleigh’s curls and his delicate body? Then Raleigh offers an olive branch of sugar and caffeine, Smudge’s favourite combination, starting them on a road to an awkward truce. And when they are conned into working together on a community project at the local hospital, the proximity ignites a spark that can’t be ignored. But navigating the murky waters that could take their relationship beyond tentative friendship all depends on whether Raleigh can release his secret fears – and whether Smudge is the man to share and allay them.

Five bliss-filled hearts - though I have a bit of a confession; for some reason this book took me a while to get into. I kept starting it, then reading something else - I just couldn't get into it. Until I could. I truly don't know why this took me so long to get into to read because I loved it enormously once I did get going. Once I properly started it was an I-can't-put-this-down kinda read. I genuinely, genuinely loved it and had a horrendous book hangover at the end. I liked the first book, and the short prequel,  in the series, so it should have been no surprise that I loved this too. It just kinda was after taking a little while to get into. My brain is a peculiar place. *shrug*

I love books that are set in Britain, especially in rural Britain, it is my favourite setting, if pushed to choose. I love small village/town stories, they generally have such a feel-good factor about them and this was no exception. Smudge and Raleigh are both characters we've met in the series as secondary characters and now it was time to find out their story. Smudge with his bad-boy aura and Raleigh seeming too good to be true - it just worked perfectly. Through in a bit of a crisis/humanitarianism/helpfulness, add a dash of UST, a pinch (and it was just a pinch thank goodness) of miscommunication, mix it up with helpful friends and a sprinkle of unnecessary jealousy and you have a beautifully baked story. The kind that warms your cockles, and make you crave tea and scones (jam first) while reading.

It's just good. A perfect series to comfort read. This book definitely can be read as a standalone - but why would you want to miss out on all the tales of Slopy Bottom? I, for one, cannot wait until the next instalment is available.

A copy of this book was given in exchange for an honest review.
For more information, see Goodreads.