I have distinctly mixed feelings about this book, but overall, I'm somewhat meh about it.

On the positive side, its premise of a Cherokee skinwalker is different enough, both from the often-cliché world of werewolves and vampires, and from other urban fantasy with a Native American base. The extra twists to Jane's skinwalker abilities (trying to avoid spoilers here) is fertile ground for the future, though only briefly edged into in this first volume.

Jane is snarky and occasionally funny. We're told she's more bad ass than we're actually shown, but she's still bad ass enough that you don't scoff. Given the indications that she's actually somewhat new to the business, that makes some sort of sense.

There are tons of ideas in the book without seeming like everything but the kitchen sink was dumped in.

On the less-positive side, I have a few issues.

I found the pidgin speech used when Beast is in control to be completely grating and totally cheesy. Your mileage may vary; perhaps you won't be as bothered by it. However, after just a few exposures, I started skimming those parts, paying only enough attention to make sure I didn't miss anything important. It seemed totally unnecessary as, more than once, Beast demonstrated higher thought processes totally at odds with the simpleton language. It was a cheap gimmick that came across as poor character construction.

My second issue is that the book is unbalanced. It's plot-light and description-heavy. A full two-thirds of the book passes before Jane even starts to come to grips with the whole point of the plot line: the monster hunt. Yet, we've had tons of food descriptions, admiring the beautiful men around her, (repetitious!) details of her stakes and knives and a Benelli shotgun's construction, etc. If you mentally strip away the fluff, it's a novella. The effect is to make the first part of the book drag and the ending to seem rushed.

Finally, that last positive thing—the tons of ideas—is also a negative. They're introduced and then went nowhere.

A good content editor could have tightened this book up, suggested a few places for more depth, and picked up on ideas that should be signaled as "coming later" to the reader. All of that would have turned this into a very good start to a series.

But as it is now, like I said at the beginning, a little meh. ( )

Fantastic book. I felt a little iffy at the beginning, but it was just a bit of a rough start. By the middle I couldn't put it down. Extremely engaging and a fun world. ( )

(2009)Jane Yellowrock is a kick-ass vampire killer who is hired by a New Orleans vampire to find and kill a rogue vampire who is making life hard for self-respecting vamps in the Big Easy.She has an ?inner?Beast who comes out in the form of a mountain lion and the transition is done very well by the author. Together they track down the rogue only to find out that is not a vampire but a ?skinwalker? like Jane. A shape shifter that has assumed the identity of the vampire son of the head of one of the vampire clans in N.O.Very good and I will definitely get caught up on the series. Not my usual kind of book. Was recommended by the pod cast Eclectic Review.

Ah I forgot how much I liked this series :D Its a reread for me but always nice to get deeper into the story and notice things I missed the first time around.

World building is great! The author describes the a very rich world in many many details. You really get a great feel for it, though I hope we get to see more than just vamps and the lonely skinwalker.

Character development is super. We get to know Jane pretty well, though much of her (and Beast's) past is still hidden. We learn about her feelings towards vampires, her work, her best friend Molly and the men she meets during her hunt for the rogue vampire. Characters are well fleshed out, they feel real and they all bring something to the table. Love how Jane is portrayed, being beaten down sometimes, not the almighty heroine doing everything on her own, though she often feels that way.

Pacing and flow were good. Sometimes I did feel some more time would have been needed healing Jane in between fights, though as a shifter I guess that could be expected. But overall a very good alternation between the action and conversations/downtime.

The book in itself was well written and I found no (noticeable) errors. There is no sex described in this book though it's only a matter of time. There are however plenty of scenes with sexual tension / innuendo.

All in all a great book one, will reread the rest of the books as well sometime soon. ( )

This book was a mess.
It was supposed to be another instance of the badass vampire hunter girl but the execution failed.
I think it would be fair to blame the editor for a lot of things as well. Maybe 50/50.
This felt more like a first manuscript that went through a very timid edit.
Lots of ideas that lead nowhere. Lots of contradictions and lazy writing in general. I wouldn't be surprised if the whole thing was written mainly in one go from start to finish without more than a very hazy idea of what the goal even was. ( )