Shifter Origins: A Werewolf, Dragon, and Jaguar Variety Pack by Aimee Easterling

Shifter Origins: A Werewolf, Dragon, and Jaguar Variety Pack Reviews

• 
  Coco.V

  🎁 FREE on Amazon today (6/10/2019)! 🎁
• 
  The Mysterious Reader

  I love Aimee Easterling’s shifter stories and her Shifter Origins: A Werewolf, Dragon, and Jaguar Variety Pack is a great introduction to them. I’ve read three of the ones in this “Pack” so far and loved each of them. I fully expect that the others are equally great. Here’s my review of the ones I’ve read so far:
  
  Shiftless
  
  I always find were stories to be "hit or miss". My faves, like Patricia Briggs' Mercy Thompson or Alpha & Omega novels, are truly wonderful, but there's an awful lot out there that are quite frankly dreck. I apply my "Briggs Test" (is it on par with Briggs) to these novels. I'm happy to report that Shiftless clearly passes that test. It was actually a lot of fun, well written and with strong characters and an excellent plot. I'm happy to recommend it.
  
  Half Wolf
  
  I've really enjoyed Aimee Easterling's other werewolf series and was looking forward to this book. It didn't disappoint. Just the opposite, it managed to give a unique take on a werewolf story. The whole concept of halfies, and how the heroine here puts aside her own inner wolf, is fascinating and very well drawn in this story. Then add in a darn good - darn thrilling - plot and excellent writing and the result is a really neat tale. Highly recommended.
  
  Huntress Born
  
  I am a fan of Aimee Easterling, having enjoyed several of her books. No surprise then that I grabbed at Huntress Born (first in her new Wolf Legacy series) as soon as I saw it. Good move on my part. This book demonstrates why I enjoy thus author’s work so much. First and foremost it’s the characters, from leading lady Ember on down. They’re complex and interesting and, well, “real” notwithstanding any paranormal elements of the story. The plot has a similarly “real” (genuine) feeling, which is definitely a neat trick to pull off in this genre. Finally, and of course most importantly, is the simple fact that the author is a darn good writer. So it’s really the “complete package” and hard to resist. There are other authors who can do this as well. In fact, Patricia Briggs, who Aimee Easterling is compared to in the publisher’s blurb, is another one. I grab all of her books just like I do with those of this author. The fact that there are others is a good thing. I wish there were more and am happy to have one here.
  
  No surprise that I hugely enjoyed, and highly recommend, this book. My only complaint is that while the story arc was completed (no cliffhanger) in now left drooling for book 2. Is best go get it.
• 
  Denise

  I was given copies of some of these books by the author. My reviews were voluntary.
  
  Shiftless (Wolf Rampant 1)
  
  This book tells the story of the early days of Wolfie and Terra. You may have read about Wolfie before in some of Aimee's other wolf tales.
  
  Terra is doing her best to survive in the human world by suppressing her wolf. She has fled from her pack and her alpha father and tried to avoid other wolves. She first meets Wolfie in his wolf form with a collar and a leash. His "owner" assures Terra that they just want to sit and talk to her, but she knows that Wolfie is an alpha male and not a pet. She gets away from them, only to run into an even worse problem - her father. He tells her that she can either come home and give him a grandson as an heir or find her nephew and help him turn for the first time and bring him to the pack.
  
  Terra did not even know she had a nephew. To make matters worse, Wolfie's pack lives nearby and Wolfie has claimed her nephew as part of his pack of misfits. He also plans to help Terra make nice with her wolf, and with his.
  
  Many things will go wrong, and some things will go right before all this is sorted out. Join Wolfie and his band of rejected wolves as they storm their way into Terra's heart.
  
  I can't wait to read the next book in the series. I wouldn't call the ending a cliffhanger, but it does leave you wanting more.
  
  Half Wolf (Alpha Wolf Underground 1)
  
  I both read and listened to the audio version of this book. I have read this entire series and was very happy to listen to book 1 as I love to listen to audio books when I walk. I remembered most of the story from my prior reading, but the initial scene at the bar still cracks me up. This is the story of a female "halfie," half-human and half wolf-shifter, who has been forced to leave the safety of the pack she belonged to. She is joined by another halfie, a set of twins (one male, one female), and a friend who is her beta. Yep, she's the alpha of the little pack and, as she considers her wolf to be the weakest of them all, she is thankful that her former alpha gave her a little of his power to help her out. She is being dogged by the very wolf that forced her exodus from her pack, and there is great danger as she makes her way through out-pack territory where halfies have suddenly become victims of kidnappings and ritual killings.
  
  Huntress Born (Wolf Legacy 1)
  
  I loved this book all the way up to the cliffhanger ending. Bad author. Lol.
  
  Ember leaves her pack family and goes in search of her half-brother. Things start to go wrong the moment she gets off the bus. She is in the territory of another pack and will need to make nice with the Alpha. There is a werewolf hanging around the bus station acting strange. Then there is the interesting Uber driver. Her job at the nearby college involves her favorite pastime - baking. At least she has that as she tries to juggle a new-found family, avoid the local Alpha's son, fight her attraction to the Uber-driver professor, dodge her father's well-meaning phone calls, and oh yeah, figure out what happened to her brother. All of this when she just wants to slink back home and wallow in her pack's love and acceptance.
  
  Incendiary Magic (Dragon Mage Chronicles 2.5)
  
  I started this story late one night and couldn’t put it down. It is a short novella about Mason, one of the dragons, and Fee, a Fire mage.
  
  Fee’s father is a Fire Mage, an abusive one. He has Fee so afraid and submissive that she has agreed to start a fire and try to get herself captured by dragons. I won’t tell you any more about the book since it is so short, but you will love Mason and Fee (short for Phoenix).
  
  Jaguar at the Portal
  
  A very different kind of shifter story. Ixchel is in hiding from her family and has been for years. She betrayed her brothers in an act of retribution and then ran. She is now a veterinarian in a small town in West Virginia. A man shows up one night with a gunshot wound and forces her to take care of it for him. Though he is insistent, she only feels slightly threatened but is not too sorry to see him go. Yeah, that won’t be the last she sees of him.
  
  Finn has been searching for answers about his heritage for a long time. His ability to shift to human form from his birth form of jaguar got him forced away from his mother and sister since he could not figure out how to shift back. While spying on an archeological dig, in the mountains of West Virginia of all places, he gets shot by the man directing the excavation of the unusual Olmec statue just as he grabs the stone figurine that he hopes will help him.
  
  This is a woo-woo- story with some ancient gods and goddesses collaborating with Finn and Ixchel. There are bad guys to hate and the easily insulted and snarky Tezcatlipoca, or Tez, or Tezzie (as Ixchel calls him). Tez is trapped in the figurine and wants Finn and Ixchel to get him out. He can enter their thoughts and talk to them in their heads. (Very annoying for them.) Off they go to Mexico to try to help out Tez, and hopefully Finn. When Ixchel’s brothers show up in the country it looks like all may be lost, but maybe not.
  
• 
  Katheyer

  “Shifter Origins” is a fantastic bundle that offers another five full-length books by the Alpha-writer of shifter stories. Three first installments in their own series, a stand-alone novella set in the Dragon Mage verse and a novel set in Mexico with links to pre-Columbian mythology. The vast diversity of the stories makes this compilation a must for any reader wishing to sample Aimee Easterling work before committing to a specific series, but make not mistake….chances are you will ended up reading them all: Easterling’s gift for storytelling is both a blessing (the stories are amazing) and a curse (it makes you never stop reading) 😉
  
  
  Shiftless (Wolf Rampant Book 1)
  Terra is a wolf-shifter that has left her own pack, a place that made her life miserable growing up. Terra respire comes to an end when a posse leaded by her own father tracks her down and give her an ultimatum: hunt down her (unable to shift) nephew and bring him back into the pack to ransom herself. Nothing good comes out of Terra’s father way of lead, and Terra will have to decide between take the ransom offer or stand up against the oppression.
  
  Half Wolf (Alpha Underground Book 1)
  Fen Young is hybrid human/wolf who is both an Alpha and a basically nice passive person, who does not really like the aggressive nature of Alphas…. until she meets Hunter Green über-alpha who takes her breath away and throws out of the pack…
  This is the first book featuring Terra as MC, and though she is a recurrent character in the Wolf Rampant Series (whose first installment is also included in this compilation) no previous knowledge of the series is necessary to enjoy the story.
  
  Huntress Born (Wolf Legacy Book 1)
  Following the disappearance of her half-brother Ember leaves the pack for the very first time and relocates to another’s pack territory. Once there Ember natural naïvete will be tested in a daily basis: a very desirable off-limits human, a very the reaction to her treats (she loves to bake), the plans of this territory alpha to wed her to her son in just a week’s time, the violent attacks on shifters, etc. Although Terra feels slightly in deep waters, her effervescent personality makes the story a funny and entertaining one, despite the violent content.
  
  Incendiary Magic (Dragon Mage Chronicles Book1)
  The novella introduces the Dragon Mage world and can be read as stand-alone. It relates the “incendiary” 😊 story of Fee (a fire mage & phoenix) and Mason (a dragon shifter), which has a rather disturbing beginning as Fee (brainwashed by her father) infiltrates the dragon lair intend to send them all to oblivion. The chemistry between the MC works well from the get-go and makes the reader invested in the outcome
  
  Jaguar at the Portal
  That is a stand alone novel, a complex story between a kidnapper in Mexico and his intended victim. Of course, Easterling being Easterling the plot thickens with numerous details that will have to remain unsaid to avoid spoilers: if you are looking forward to shifters, you will be rewarded with not only Jaguars, but a vast variety of mythological pre-Columbian characters set against the astonishing background of the Aztec Pyramids.
  
• 
  Michelle Promotion's for Indie Author's csmindiepr

  Boxset “Shifter Origins”
  By Aimee Easterling
  .
  There have been a number of Paranormal romance and Fantasy romance Author’s that I always go back to, simply because they were either born with or had developed a very special talent.
  Through their imagination and descriptive abilities the author can naturally relate to us with incredible clarity the numerous characters they create and as readers we are automatically taken into the imagination and world that’s been created for us to experience with an ease that can often be a huge stumbling block to many other writers.
  Although I have been reading this genrè for years Ms Easterling’s books keep pulling me back each time to see where the dramatic action and adventures that tend to often develop within her stories, from the tenaciously strong male and female characters, to the very human side of them that suddenly jumps out at us, as these characters become very real. We find ourselves invested in these amazing people’s lives and unending drama as the the emotional and realistic reactions that tend to wind around whatever these characters are dealing with, pulls at us in such a way I personally find my protective instincts kick in.
  To put word’s on paper that develop a canvas full of colors, events, supernatural creatures of myths and fantasy, yet finding you’re attached to them, hoping against hope gives us a belief that if we really did have to face the blood, desires and primal urges that effect many of these tender yet vicious people (monsters from our dreams) we could deal with what is uniquely an unstoppable set of advents with even a touch of the style and class found in this world.
  This in my opinion is why an Author with the caliber of Aimie Easterling allows us to see taste and almost smell both types of species as they battle the webs that often weave a completely unbelievable set of circumstances.
  This set of different storyline’s have similarities, that are identical to the daily problems we outselves deal with, and our very human emotions and actions are felt in each book.
  Yet I can tell you without a doubt that each one of those book’s takes you where you feel as if you are reading work written by different Author’s . Such is the talent and artistic ability found in this truly brilliant Author .
  If fantasy and paranormal storyline’s with alpha shifters and strong women that can include dramatic variations to who finds love in the most unusual and unexpected way, pull you to read and suddenly need to find the next book, then you are going to love this Author and the calculating but stubborn characters she creates. I highly recommend you grab this box-set, your going to have trouble putting it down, I know, I was up all night. Enjoy.
• 
  Rosemary

  Shifter Origins - a review by Rosemary Kenny
  
  This amalgamation of tales by the Princess of Fantasy, Aimee Easterling, weaves a thread of imagination around the 'births' of five very different
  major characters in Ms Easterling's novels.
  
  The first is Shiftless, that tells how Terra Wilder a Were princess flees from a forced mating. Unsure of her half-wolf nature, she encounters others of her kind and soon learns that the life she's fled from is not as dangerous as the one she now finds herself in. What happens next will shock and amaze you.
  
  Second is Huntress Bound; Sebastien is a human professor pf science who mates with Ember - a Were. When he's kidnapped by Government agents determined to hide this event, Ember must decide who she can trust amongst her own kind to help her rescue Sebastien before it's too late.
  
  Third tale is Half Wolf, which tells the story of half-Were Fen Young. Ejected from her pack by usurper Hunter Green, Fen is in deadly peril as she rejects her wolf side, even though she's physically weak and indecisive as a human. Hunting the 'halfies' like Fen is a secret society, whose mission is to torture and kill them all. Can Fen and her ilk survive the horrors of the outside world?
  
  Incendiary Magic is a standalone tale incorporated into the set as it tells of Phoenix (aka Fee), a Fire Mage. Sent by her cruel father to destroy any and all Weres/shifters she can locate, with a bomb that he alone has the detonator of, can Fee survive and defy her deadly heritage to start afresh?
  
  Finally, Jaguar at the Portal tells of Were-Jaguar Finn, who in human form earns a living as a cat-burglar. Ixchel is a rural human vet, fleeing from her violent brothers, who encounters Finn and the two realise their feelings for each other. With a pre-Columbian setting of exotic jungle and ancient crumbling ruins this story will take many strange and often dangerous twists and turns before their love can be fulfilled.
  
  Overall this compendium of original and fascinating stories melds into an engaging whole that is sure to mystify and entertain in equal measure. Get your copy as soon ans you can and enter a whole new world that you never knew existed til now. Better still, tell all your friends to buy it too - and enjoy the journey together!
• 
  Nicole Henderson

  These are just some of my reviews for this set. A great set of stories put together
  Shiftless
  What can I say I enjoyed this book. It was slightly different from the other shifter books I have read but that's what makes it its own.
  We get to meet Terra who has left her pack and has learnt to keep her wolf away.
  We meet Wolfie (yes that right) who is a bloodling wolf and also an Alpha.
  We also meet Keith Terras nephew who doesn't know what he is yet.
  A chance meeting has Terra meeting Wolfie and unbeknown to Terra Wolfie is keeping an eye on her nephew.
  Terra doesn't want anything to do with pack life but her father comes back into her life after a decade and asks her to bring Keith into the pack.
  The story has a semi happy ending and you'll need to read the rest of the series to know how it all unfolds.
  
  Half Wolf
  Well I was right Hunter and Fen from the end of Wolf Ascendent got thier own series.
  So this series picks up a few weeks after Fen has been gifted the mantel of Alpha from Wolfie making her not only the second only every female alpha but she is also only a halfie.
  Fen like Terra both have lots of insecurites about themselves but the past can scar us in ways that people dont realise.
  In this book Fen has taken her tiny pack and and is having trouble with the trouble twins aptly named as that is exactly where the book starts the twins namely Ginger is causing all sorts of trouble. A galant wolf comes to the resuce and Fens stalker also shows up.
  We see Fen taking the right steps and asking who should be admittied into their little pack but will the right decission be made?????
• 
  Mary

  This is a wonderful collection by a really great author. Aimee Easterling is one of my all-time favorite authors. I fell in love with Wolfie back in the Wolf Rampant series, followed him through the Bloodling serial series, and I was hooked. I own all of Ms. Easterling's books. She is an expert at weaving her plot, so that you can't wait to turn the page to see what happens next. Her characters are well-rounded and so realistic that they virtually jump off the page. Before you know it, you start to care about the characters, and what will happen to them. I can't count the hours of sleep I've lost because I couldn't put down one of Ms. Easterling's books. This collection will give you an excellent opportunity to read some outstanding books by a really great writer.
• 
  Staci

  I really love the books by Aimee Easterling, she takes a fresh spin on shifter books. Aimee Easterling's books are a definite must read!
  
  Shiftless is about Terra who spent the past years burying her past, but also ends up burying herself and leaving an ache in the process, then she meets Wolfie who helps feel that ache while helping her with her nephew. Great read I read it in one night, I could not put the book down!
  
  Half Wolf is about Fen a halfie who's trying to strengthen the bonds of her newfound pack, while a ruthless shifter pack is hunting down halfies. This is much different than most books I've read and I truly enjoyed every minute of it.
  
  Huntress Born is about Ember, who goes to the city to find her brother. I really liked Ember's baking, too.
  
• 
  Emily Pennington

  This is one of my favorite authors, especially because her paranormal stories are most always different from the mainstream stories of others. It lets us get a fresh way of looking at things and it’s always a pleasant surprise. The story lines are always good and draw the reader in from the start. The characters are well described and believable; and what’s important to me is that she makes the reader care about them. Once hooked like that, you can easily see how it’s easy to keep reading to the end!
  
  Take a chance on this collection! I have read and own several of them and they are excellent! It’s well worth taking a chance on this set – you will be well pleased!
  
• 
  Sherry Vaughan

  Rather Good
  
  I always have a hard time when evaluating anthologies. I must say, this one was rather good. I will definitely read some more in two of the series. As a matter of fact, I have some of the other books in my library already. I was disappointed with Incendiary Magic because it was much too short and underdeveloped. And, The Panther at the Portal seemed to be an afterthought--add if it were just thrown in for good measure.
• 
  Linda Levine

  This author is a great choice for those who enjoy paranormal romances. I highly recommend this set. You get several great books.
  
  Shiftless is a great story. Terra is a really interesting character and I really liked her strength. I enjoyed the storyline. It keeps your interest from start to finish.
• 
  Bridget Owensby

  I have red most of these stories already and the series afterwards. You will not be let down. Great first books and they really allow you to sink your teeth into the genre. I Love Aimee Easyerling's take on the shifter story and I binge read all I can get. If you love shifters, try this. I'm sure you'll love them too!
• 
  Joan Bernicky

  Great Author Great Stories
  
  I like to read women authored books because they make strong female characters where as men make women wimpy winee characters that can't get out of problems without a man's help.
  And no! I'm not an aggressive man hating lesbian.
  I'm an 80 year old great grandma who loves good written paranormal adventures.
• 
  Dascha

  I don’t understand All these high ratings. The writing is very disjointed. It’s like the author has several scenes or events that have occurred in her head but forgot to put them down on paper. I kept going back pages to see if I missed something that would make what’s happening make sense. Super frustrating! Gave up.
• 
  Nikki Stromire

  Great read
  
  I loved all these books I just wish they had been longer so I could have gotten to know the characters after as always lol please write more with these same characters showing their lives please!!!
• 
  Susan Carroll

  Wolves, Dragons, Jaguars, oh my!
  
  Wolves, dragons, .jaguars and humans mix and match in these novels. Aimee Easterling has a wonderful way of making me believe, and wanting to be part of the packs.
• 
  Heather

  Great set of starter books.
  
  I really enjoyed reading these books. They are wonderful for those who are just starting out in the paranormal/shifter classification of books. I really recommend reading this wonderful collection. I really hope you like them as much as I have.
• 
  Debby Cash

  A great introduction to these very entertaining shifter stories. Well worth reading and will make you want to read more.