Mating the Huntress by Talia Hibbert
Mating the Huntress is a paranormal romance novella by romance author Talia Hibbert, featuring naturally a pairing between a Huntress (duh) and a Werewolf. It's the type of combination that is almost stereotypical at this point for the genre, and I'd never have noticed this novella if a SF/F author I like didn't recommend it on twitter - which made me give it a try.
And I'm very glad I did. Mating the Huntress is incredibly entertaining and very sexy at times (particularly with two sex scenes). But it's also very very surprising in how it subverts some of the more expected plot points for this type of story, as two potential enemies fall in lust for one another. The story is not long, and if you're hoping for a slow burn well, nope, this is very much the "want to jump the other's bones from the beginning" type of story. But it's done so well that I really enjoyed it and I definitely recommend it to fantasy romance readers.
Some more specifics after the jump:
Quick Plot Summary: Luke Anthony knows he's supposed to be an evil thing of the dark as a werewolf, but usually all he wants is to be left alone to do his own art and allowed to wait out his transformation in his forest under the full moon. But now that he's seen Chastity, the barrista at a local coffee shop, he wants more...he wants her to be his mate. And after he escaped being hunted down by Huntresses while transformed, one of whom smelled of Chastity, he's been working up more and more the courage to speak to her and to ask her out.
Chastity Adofo has spotted Luke all right - after all he's there every day in the coffee shop. But she also knows what he is, a werewolf, the thing that her entire family hunts....the thing that she would hunt, except that her parents won't let her due to some stupid prophecy. So when Luke finally asks her out, Chastity knows it's her chance to prove herself, to kill a werewolf on her own. If only she could figure out why her body feels so strange looking at him, or why her heart skips a beat when he asks her over to his house.....
Thoughts: There's a way this type of story is supposed to go: the Huntress and Werewolf are supposed to secretly be enemies, who fall in love with each other instead (maybe after a murder attempt or two), and have to deal with their loved ones - in this case Chastity's Hunter/Huntress family - not understanding and trying to intervene for their own good. And so when I picked up this novella, I resigned myself to that plotline, which I figured was worth it for the steamy romantic scenes and the incredibly entertaining dialogue (Hibbert's writing is often HILARIOUS).
And then Mating the Huntress swerves by not going that route at all, with Chastity's family's reaction being entirely different than how I expected, and the story skipping more than a momentary, self-caused heartbreak, on its way to a Happily Ever After. And both Chastity - unsure but wanting to prove herself, afraid of commitment to what could be forever - and Luke - knowing that he needs Chastity to be his forever mate and yet absolutely willing to respect her choices - are so so good together. The concept of a werewolf feeling the need for a specific woman to be his mate could be so so creepy, but Hibbert plays it so well by making sure that Luke respects Chastity's choice to say No, even if it pains him, and it makes you root for the two of them so much.
Highly recommended for anyone looking for romance.
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