113. How to Date Your Dragon by Molly Harper

listened on Audible

2018

200 estimated pgs. 6 hrs+ audible only)
Adult Fant/Romance
Finished 12/14/2021
Goodreads rating: 3.94
My rating: 2
Setting: supposedly contemporary Louisiana bayou town

My comments: Absolutely ridiculous story, why do I waste my time with such trite trash?  An anthropologist goes to Louisiana bayou town to discover how all the shape-shifters there get along with each other so well.  Of course, as soon as she arrives, murders begin to happen.  The story skips around a lot and develops weirdly.  I'm not a big fan of the southern accents that were used, either, though I'm sure they depicted what people who live there might sound like. Just not good.

Goodreads synopsis:  Anthropologist Jillian Ramsay's career has taken a turn south.

Concerned that technology is about to chase mythological creatures out into the open (how long can Sasquatch stay hidden from Google maps?), the League for Interspecies Cooperation is sending Jillian to Louisiana on a fact-finding mission. While the League hopes to hold on to secrecy for a little bit longer, they're preparing for the worst in terms of human reactions. They need a plan, so they look to Mystic Bayou, a tiny town hidden in the swamp where humans and supernatural residents have been living in harmony for generations. Mermaids and gator shifters swim in the bayou. Spirit bottles light the front porches after twilight. Dragons light the fires under crayfish pots.

Jillian's first assignment for the League could be her last. Mystic Bayou is wary of outsiders, and she has difficulty getting locals to talk to her. And she can't get the gruff town sheriff, Bael Boone, off of her back or out of her mind. Bael is the finest male specimen she's seen in a long time, even though he might not be human. Soon their flirtation is hotter than a dragon's breath, which Bael just might turn out to be.... 

36. Highland Shifter by Catherine Bybee

#4 MacCoinnich Time Travels

listened on Audible freebie

narrated by David Monteath

Unabridged audio (9:17)
2012
296 pgs.
Adult time travel
Finished 4/10/2021
Goodreads rating: 4.25 - 1616 ratings
My rating: 3.5
Setting: Contemporary America/medieval Scotland

First line/s: "Energy buzzed down Helen's spine until she shivered with the electrical current her gift created."

My comments: Two years have gone by in contemporary America, yet 15 or 16 years have gone by in medieval Scotland.  Simon is now 30 and each set of married couples has three or four kids to add the the melee.  And then Helen arrives from contemporary California because of a necklace that whe wears, purchased at an antique shop years before.  She works as an antiques appraiser, and travels to contemporary Scotland where we ends up time traveling and landing in Simon's path.  Of course it's practically instalove.  I like the story of this episode, but I never really became enamored with Helen for some reason.  She was kind and interesting, but I weirdly never connected with her character, so that was disappointing.  The physical attraction between Simon and Helen worked - she had grown up on the streets and had a bit of non-virginal background and was much more real than two of the three previous virginal female protagonists.  There's one more in the series to go, but I've read the reviews and I find that she has left that fifth book with a huge cliffhanger, and that was eight years ago....and she's not even hinted at a sequel.  I've also read a few spoilers that show Ms. Bybee has gone in a different direction, with a different feel, than the previous four books.  I think I will just leave it for now and not ready number five, at least at this time.

Goodreads synopsis:  A mysterious Druid book and Helen’s sixth sense send her to Scotland in search of a missing boy. After being attacked by strange men dressed in medieval garb, a handsome, desirable hero answering to the boy’s name rescues her. No one is more surprised than she to find herself in sixteenth century Scotland. Unable to deny the reality of time travel, Helen discovers smoldering passion with a man destined to leave her.
          Simon has lived his Druid life in two very different worlds, two vastly different times, and when Helen practically lands in his lap, he knows his life is about to change forever. There are enemies in California lying in wait for her, and an army in Scotland closing in on his family. Simon is the only person who can protect her. But when she learns his most guarded secret, will she still want him? Can Helen love a Highland Shifter?

42. Sacrificed to the Dragon by Jessie Donovan

#1 Stonefire Dragons
Listened to Audible on Chirp
narrated by Matthew Lloyd Davies
Unabridged audio (6:29)
2014 Mythical Lake Press
258 pgs.
Adult Fantasy Steamy Romance
Finished 3/2/2020
Goodreads rating: 3.89 - 7062 ratings
My rating: 2.5
Setting:  United Kingdom

First line/s: "Melanie Hall sat in the reception area of the Manchester Dragon Affairs Office, tapping her finger against her arm, and wishing they'd hurry the hell up."

My comments:  (The interesting concept here is that a dragon lives INSIDE the shifter, not that the dragon and the person are one in the same.)  The narrator changed voices a lot, depending on the person he was speaking for, but he made Tristan's dragon sound like an imbecile.  Very offputting.  You got to know the two protagonists' characteristics pretty well, but all the others were pretty flat.  I woldn've also liked a bit more description of the setting.  Yes, there were steamy parts, but there was a lot otf talking, thinking, discussion about the same things over and over again.  It did seem to go on and on, there were absolutely no surprises, and everything seemed....well, flat.  Even the actufaal shape shifting couldn've used a lot more description.  Oh well, I did not expect much.

Goodreads synopsis:  In exchange for a vial of dragon’s blood to save her brother’s life, Melanie Hall offers herself up as a sacrifice to one of the British dragon-shifter clans. Being a sacrifice means signing a contract to live with the dragon-shifters for six months to try to conceive a child. Her assigned dragonman, however, is anything but easy. He’s tall, broody, and alpha to the core. There’s only one problem—he hates humans.
          Due to human dragon hunters killing his mother, Tristan MacLeod despises humans. Unfortunately, his clan is in desperate need of offspring to repopulate their numbers and it’s his turn to service a human female. Despite his plans to have sex with her and walk away, his inner dragon has other ideas. The curvy human female tempts his inner beast like no other.          
NOTE: This is the entire first story arc of the Stonefire Dragons, complete with a HEA and no cliffhangers.

DNF - Magic Bites by Ilona Andrews

listened to audio on AUDIBLE (It's still in my cloud - what a waste of money for me!)
Kate Daniels #1
2007, Ace
280 pgs.- I listened to the equivalent of about 60 of them
"Urban Fantasy"
Ended 5/8/15
Goodreads rating:
My rating: I didn't enjoy it at all
Setting: Magical Atlanta, a short time in the future:

My comments:  I'm not going to rate this one, since I only got through about 60 pages.  It came highly recommended, but this genre (whatever it's called) just isn't my cup of tea.  There's too many books waiting for me to spend time reading something I don't enjoy.  It's probably a wonderful book, just not for me.

Goodreads synopsis:  Kate Daniels is a down-on-her-luck mercenary who makes her living cleaning up paranormal problems. Atlanta has two factions struggling for power. Masters of the Dead are necromancers who control vampires. The Pack are a paramilitary clan of shapechangers. When Kate's guardian is killed, she is caught between.

16. Bones of Faerie - Janni Lee Simner

For: Gr. 5 and up
Published: 2009
248 easy pages
Rating: 3.5ish
Finished: Fri. night, Mar. 13, 2009

Well, this was an interesting book that was really difficult to rate. Will I feel differently about it tomorrow, or when I get a chance to talk with someone about it? Most probably. With shades of The Giver, magic, healers, faerie folk, apocolyptic overtones, cruel father and shapeshifting-to-wolf friend, it's a difficult book to describe and to rate.

Liza lives in post-war midwestern US, where you can not venture from your town because the world is a totally different place since the war. Branches and roots come up to strangle you. Nowhere is safe. Magic has turned up everywhere, and magic destroys. Magic is to be feared. So when Liza begins discovering that she has her own magic, she decides to leave her tiny community before they find out about it and kill her.

This begins her quest story, her quest for the truth about her mother, the truth about her magic, and the true meaning of trust and friendship.