What do you think of Jennifer Ashely's Shifters series?

polandspring · Joined: 10 Aug 2011 Posts: 17

Hi friends,

This is the latest series that I'm into, and I'm curious to know other readers' opinions. JA is my favorite author, but one thing that constantly crops up in these books that annoys me is the "I'm free and independent...and I don't mind being controlled by the hero!" trop that she avoids in other books.

Also, at times the persecution of Shifters is unconvincing. Obviously, differently types of persecution are very present in all areas of our society, but I can't buy people being forcibly relocate into ghettos without a major public outcry, which she never addresses.

Has anyone read shifter books from other authors?

~ps

erika · Joined: 26 Mar 2007 Posts: 290

I've read a few of Ashley's Shifter books but wasn't impressed. They weren't compelling.
The controlling alpha hero wasn't a problem for me as I don't read romances thru a feminist mindset.

Lora Leigh, Christine Feehan writes Shifter books.

dallase · Joined: 08 Jan 2012 Posts: 24 Location: Arizona

But Valiant isn't a shifter. Her "New Species" books are about people who have been crossed with animal DNA. Laurann Dohner does have a shifter series, the first one is His Purrfect Mate.

A really fun shifter series is G. A. Aiken's Dragons.

Lynda X · Joined: 05 Apr 2007 Posts: 1250

Originally, I really liked the Shifter series by Jennifer Ashley, but after the opening book, the others books were just he usual repetitious paranormals. I agree that she needs to do a lot more logical world building.

Christine Feehan started the whole paranormal romance, with a lot of the details (like the shifter looking for his “true mate,” without whom, he suffers or dies, etc.). I really loved her books in the beginning, but they’ve been copied a lot, so they don’t seem as original as they were in the beginning.

Patricia Briggs writes a whole series of books about different shifters. Her Mercy series is about a woman mechanic who shifts into being a coyote. Over the books, we see the transition between her deciding between two men. The Mercy series is less romantic, but still excellent. I prefer Briggs’s Alpha and Omega series, starting with ON THE PROWL, an excellent anthology. If you can get ahold of it, it will tell you whether you like this romantic series in a short novel. Briggs has written only a couple of novels in the series, after the novella, but it’s one of my favorite paranormal books.

Thea Harrison wrote the best book of last year, IMO. It was not the usual shifter plot with the usual characters. Most people loved, loved, LOVED her DRAGON BOUND. Harrison has continued the series in about three or four books since, but they are not as good, IMO, as the first. If you like shifter books and you haven’t read this one, boy, have you got a treat in store for you. It’s funny, suspenseful, romantic and just plain fun.