Panda and the Kitty - Eve Langlais

It struggled for that 3, much as I struggled to even get into it.

Our H/h, both shifters, and apparently mates, met way too young I think. He had family obligations, and she had the understanding of a gnat. She spent way too much time dwelling on his "letting her down" when she knew the family he was from to start with so what exactly did she expect him to do?

He took up drinking apparently because of this and was a nasty drunk. Enter mommy dearest who flat out tells him she has no feelings for her family, then disappears him for over 3 months where she experiments on him, then dumps him at the family compound. He eventually leaves and disappears for a bit, then after an apparent arrest attempt, finds himself shifting into a completely different animal.

Things that bug me... ah...most of the book? Nobody stopping to think maybe he had a tracker on him courtesy of his "loving" mother? Nobody ever stopping to consider the orphan might have come from the lab? Really, she could hide her scent. The h's attitude towards the H. The fact that we get a second round of some evil person experimenting on shifters. The lack of any real humor...

'Roo and the Angel - Eve Langlais

The later books in this series aren't as entertaining as the earlier ones. Oh, the previous one had its moments but to be honest, I think a large part of it is the whole "same plot, different antagonist" bit. Well, that and this book seemed to be rather light on the actual relationship development. Time was skipped, with the characters apart for various reasons, and what time they were together seemed to be in the middle of some sort of drama. IOW, how did they fall in love? They weren't together enough to even know what each other's full name was.

And really, I'm not sold on the whole "create mutants via experiments" theme when they seem to do just fine with that via interbreeding (the sabertoothed giant bunny from book 1 for example). In this case, they've created a mythical beastie which makes me think of the chimera series by the same author. Seems redundant.

Capturing a Unicorn - Eve Langlais

Perhaps this series would have been better wrapped up with the previous book. After all, once you've written the story about the central character, what's the point of continuing? And too, the purpose for this one feels more like a way of tying up loose ends, but it's done haphazardly.

The H... I kept picturing the reporter in Tim Burton's Batman (not Vickie Vale; the other one). He spends the first half of the book being an arse because mutants. We see a turnaround, but I'm not sure I believe it really.

The h... eh.

The background noise AKA the overarching plot is a conclusion on the whole "who's hunting them?" bit. Sortof. Because the people hunting them in the previous books aren't the ones hunting them now, but instead they're the H's mom's goons. Because of course. And of course, what better way to underscore that arsehole's initial attitude is wrong than to have mommy dearest give him the same treatment?

The real issue I had with this series in general is that it was all released over the course of a year or so, which means all the books were written entirely too close together for plot inconsistencies to occur. Book one had the H becoming a dick and getting locked away because he realized he had no freedom. Book two had the ones who went feral being hidden in a cage in a secret lab (even the secret lab has secret labs) and being "iced" if they went truly feral. Book 3 had the h with complete freedom to be a mercenary even though she's one of the experiments, and the ferals locked in cages on the level the H in book one was in, Book 4 was the outlier in that at the end of book 3, the lab was blown up so it took place at a house in the woods. Book five indicated that well, only the upper levels of the lab blew, and that a lot were left behind, locked in their cages to die. Strangely enough, that was never addressed after the H/h were collected and taken to that relic of a hotel the gang was hiding in.

And of course there's the bit where we have everyone being injected with all sorts of "natural" DNA, which explains one with wolf characteristics, one with lion characteristics, and one hyena. One could even sort of explain a mermaid - fish exist after all. But how do you get a phoenix? How do you get a unicorn? Demon/vampire/something or other? You kinda need an explanation there; things like that don't just appear out of nowhere.

And IS it over? It says "the end" at the end, but the tied ends are rather loose.

A Chimera's Revenge - Eve Langlais

I am...so torn. On the one hand, seeing our former villain's struggle with his inner monster, his caring for the h, which had been there before he ever started experimenting... And yet, previous books indicated a complete lack of concern about anything or anyone. That's problem A. That until the end of the previous book, there was no indication he really concerned himself about others.

And then you find he's kept the h's comatose body in a penthouse for...an undetermined amount of time, because he cared about her.

(scratches head)

Problem B would be the sudden delving into the supernatural. Up until now, the theme was they used some method to give animal DNA to damaged humans to help them heal. 1) we have a flipping phoenix, 2) the other Dr has apparently turned into a vampire or demon or..something.

So the H has kept the h hooked up to equipment in his penthouse for...years. She's been in a coma since ODing 20 years before. Her parents died, and he ah...absconded with her before she got unhooked. Sleeping beauty has undergone his special treatments, yet remains comatose...until he makes the decision that he's got to hide evidence he was here and blows the penthouse. Since the h has turned into a phoenix of sorts, she's finally warm enough to come out of hibernation. He finds out she's alive after she's seen walking into burning buildings, starkers. He manages to catch her attention, bad guys show up, failed experiments show up, a not-so-failed experiment and his wife show up... Eventually they are sort of all together but still being tracked.

Just guessing here but equipping a room to be a lab, complete with hospital bed, would likely get someone's attention. Just also guessing but if your former partner sold you out, you probably should have changed all the locks immediately, so to speak, as it's likely he knew all your bolt holes.

The Lionman Kidnapping - Eve Langlais

Lessee... the H has issues, mostly due to having been - prior to the treatments - a scrawny dweeb with a receding hairline (well, that's how the book described him). He was the sort who would have lived in his mother's basement if his mother had been a tolerale human being. He ended up in the treatment program, not of his own volition, but because he had a car accident and was on life support. His mom essentially sold him to Chimera. So... he has no idea what he looks like now; just that he has all these animalistic urges, and also no idea how any of this happened.

The h...is a free roaming experiment, and also the daughter of one of the Drs. She fried her brain from drug use and has not much of a conscience. She's called in to fetch the H, who has been roaming wild, just outside the lab.

Issues I had - he was a little too forgiving of a woman who injected him with tranquilizers multiple times (including the point where he was recaptured). She was just a little too...cold blooded about it.

There are other issues, relating to the series in general but they can wait for that last book.