Review: Disappointing Novella
Rating: 2 out of 5
Date: 02 22, 2013
My love of shifter stories is known far and wide. So, I really wanted to like this book. Unfortunately, the story didn't work for me.Novellas are difficult to write because of limited word counts, and The Perfect Mate could have used a bit more plot...with better conflict.I liked the idea that Susan was a 30'ish wolf on the run. Interesting question that made me want to read on. We find out why she initially runs, but the rest of the behavior makes no sense. No other pack lets her stay because she won't tell anyone why she left her old pack. So she drifts from town to town for a year. Then she finally believes she's found a pack master that will believe her and tells him everything.After running for a year and speaking with countless other pack masters, there had to be at least one other pack master that would have believed her tragic circumstances and helped. Would have made more sense if she'd gone directly to the one pack master that had a reputation for integrity and moved the plot forward from there.I liked that Susan had spunk. Unfortunately, some of the dialogue and behavior was immature and reminded me more of a college student living in a dorm. As for her internal conflict, well, it's believable... but not enough for the story to be dimensional.My biggest pet peeves are in the editing department: misspellings, incorrect word usage and misused contractions. Occasional mistakes will happen, but the number of editing issues are numerous...and they happened at critical moments. Was a definite mood kill.For me, this story was sadly disappointing.