Welcome everyone, to my review of Abigail Owen’s two new releases, The Mate (a prequel) and The Boss.

Prepare yourselves because I over think everything.  Even reviews of shape shifter romance.

I have worked with Abigail Owen before.  She’s a delightful lady who can churn out a love story like it’s nobody’s business.  I volunteered to read her latest releases in exchange for an honest opinion.

So…let’s get down to some story, dragons, sex appeal and character types.  Let’s get a little uptight….perhaps a little weird or over-analytical.  Then…we’ll relax. 

Having read some of Abigail’s YA stuff, I was curious where she’d take steamier grown up romance.

Let’s start with The Mate.  It’s a shorter story involving Fallon, the younger brother of Finn (the male lead in The Boss).  Fallon is summoned to a choosing ceremony in France.  Owen’s world involves dragon shifters of different colors (some are fast, some brutal fighters, some better at espionage depending on whether they’re blue, gold, black, etc.).  The Dragon clans come from all over the world and settle in colonies elsewhere.  They involve themselves in the human world investigating arson, helping with forest fires, etc.  Owens’ dragons can absorb fire back into their bodies.  Oh…and the men are mostly on the tall side, with striking eyes and rather virile. 

I feel I have to say something here.  I’m all about welcoming different standards of beauty for both men and women.  I don’t think it’s fair to expect every dude to look twenty eight, have a six-pack and a jaw line to rival any personal trainer/male model.  

At the moment I’m keen to see love stories involving characters who struggle to get up a flight of stairs, who are a bit softer around the middle and a bit rougher around the edges.  The thing with these hot dragon shifter ultra male dragons is…yes they are super attractive (handsome shaming is unfair, even if not as nasty and damaging as fat or ugly shaming)…but looks ARE secondary to the love.  The Mate and The Boss are about the specific connection between the specific characters more than “oh that guy has abs and is thus worthy of love and sexual fulfillment”…sort of deal.   

I’m critical of double standards.  We’ll get to that in a bit.  This is supposed to be fun. 

Anyhoo, another aspect of this dragon shifter world is that male dragons can’t fall in love with and have little dragon shifter babies with just anyone.  They need to find a female hidden in the human world who is secretly a “dragon shifter mate”.  Signs of being one of these lucky ladies include a hidden brand on the back of the neck or maybe starting fires without intending to.  Once recognized, these ladies are then presented to a council of sorts who choose possible male dragon shifter mates and they go through a process of spending time together until ultimately the lady chooses her mate out of the male dragon shifters. 

Almost everyone is hot here. I guess flying around and working in the business of catching arsonists and containing fires keeps you fit.  Plus, other worldly creatures in paranormal romance stories tend to be on the attractive side.  Just relax and enjoy it, Jessica…jeez. You aren’t perpetuating unfair standards of beauty by enjoying a damn good shape shifter romance. 

Okay.  This is the clincher.  This is important.  The mating ceremony itself involves the couple (now Council approved) getting some alone time, getting intimate and then the male gives his lady mate one hell of a kiss involving pushing his fire inside of her with his mouth (he is still in human form btw but they can summon their fire all the same).  This, all being well, means that his woman is transformed into a proper dragon shifter and they then live (for a very long time) happily ever after.  All not being well, (meaning the match was not meant to be), the dragon fire burns the woman from the inside and she dies a horrible painful death in her would be lover’s arms while he watches in helpless terror and despair.

In The Mate, Fallon is taken aback when he sees a possible mate for him, chosen by the Council to be a previous (as far as he was concerned, human) colleague named Maddie.  These two really, REALLY liked each other while working on an arson case a few months previous.  However, seeing as Fallon did not recognize any “dragon mate” qualities in Maddie…he had to ignore his feelings and he buggered off.  She was annoyed (as you would be) by his abrupt departure from her life.  She was pretty into him (as you would be).  Maddie is a funny t-shirt wearing, independent sort who is a little freaked out by suddenly finding out about the existence of dragon shifters (as you would be).

I won’t give too much more away…The Mate is a prequel to The Boss. 

The Boss is the main event.  The main male player here is Finn, Fallon’s older brother. Now Finn…has previously experienced the very very bad version of the mating ceremony.  It gave him PTSD and he isn’t all that keen on finding love again.  He’s too traumatized (as you would be).  That’s the last time I say that, I promise. 

Enter Delaney, a (by all immediate observations) human who has an issue with a stalker, black outs and fires.  She’s also suffered a horrendous loss in her life due to fire.  She’s very sweet and a tad self-sacrificing.  Finn is literally, The Boss of a hot shot crew of dragon shifters (including Fallon although he’s away pursuing Maddie in France while Finn’s story is going on) who sort out rogue shifters up to no good and contain forest fires…stuff like that.

There’s political upheaval in the Dragon world while all this is happening which makes things awkward for the potential couples.  Not everyone is into this stringent, old world Mating Council choosing ceremony deal.  There’s going to be more of this, I can tell.  I can smell the elements of loyalty at all costs, the get with the winning team types, betrayal and espionage potential is all there.  It’s about to kick off in dragon shifter world. 

Make no mistake, this is a fully built, international, functioning world with its own politics, history, shady characters, hardships, rises and falls.  Owen could probably tell you how each individual shifter’s house is decorated and on what date they pay their electric bill every month.  She’s likely also catalogued every t-shirt Maddie owns and what fitness equipment Levi uses most.

This is not some hastily thrown together paranormal nonsense just so that heterosexual cis females can read about sexy magic jaw line abs guy doing the lucky girl next door (who also happens to be gorgeous). 

Let’s be honest after Twilight and 50 Shades everyone and their mother was like “I want to make money by writing about sexy yet crazy unrealistic one dimensional dudes who get really REALLY into the girl next door *cough* who is like me!” 

As I’m sure Abigail Owen and many, many other romance or erotica or hell…ANY writers in general making a living from your craft is not a given.  Like at all.  Let’s bat that myth right out of here….

Abigail Owen (whose other pen name is Kadie Scott), is a professional.  Her writing is polished, she’s an experienced story teller. She’s well aware of the tropes and dynamics at play in romance books.  She knows what works because she’s a fan of the genre itself.  She can world build in her sleep.  She brings two people who as a reader, you can invest in.  You can see why they would be drawn together.  The chemistry is palpable. My heart broke for Delaney and Finn as what they’d been through before meeting is integral to the story.  

These are realistic characters apart from the whole dragon shifter, fire breathing magic mating symbols deal. 

Suspension of disbelief, you BEAUTY!  

Another aspect of The Boss is that it’s…like really sexy.  Like it’s entering into proper erotica territory at certain points.  There’s dirty talk.  There’s a pair of dragon shifters named Keighan and Rivin who….okay you know what?  No spoilers.  I was rather taken aback by the level of steam.  There’s this one shifter named Levi and…okay.  It’s worth reading.  Owen is not done.  There’s more to come.  All the lovely fellows who work for Finn are going to have their day in the sun. 

I’m going to over-analyze a bit again. As stated before, I’m a cis female, heterosexual, fifty shades of really into paranormal stuff sort.  You could say I fit somewhere in Abigail Owen’s target audience.  You could say that.

I do get upset by the abundance of imagery involving women with perfect peach butts, tiny waists and dewy complexions who incidentally could rarely pass for over twenty five.  Yet I also get that always having topless, not an ounce of fat on them muscle dudes with the flawless jaw lines who could rarely pass for over thirty five images of “hot” men isn’t fair either.

Again, I’m not trying to handsome shame poor Finn or Fallon.  They were designed by Abigail Owen not just to appeal to the likes of me, but also to tell a story.  And by the way, they don’t have it easy.  Owen really messes with them and their potential happiness. 

She’s not all “Yes my beautiful darlings, that nasty villain just tried to hurt your special lady….but don’t worry he’ll give you an attractive scar that will make you extra manly before you easily defeat him and ride off into the sunset for some naughty time…” 

She’s really more “You are really messed up and your world is cruel.  You could easily live for thousands of years in pure misery.  Prepare for suffering.  Suffer. Suffer. Little bit happy. Get exceptionally aroused.  Suffer. Naughty…naughty stuff.  Fight.  Suffer.  Funny….now really very naughty…” Okay I won’t do a spoiler like I did before.

Anyway I don’t want to gorgeous shame female Instagram models or lady adult performers who likely are there to appeal to cis male heterosexual Fifty Shades of hot co-ed sorts…I just want to be real here. 

There was a lot of guffawing over “Mom porn” a while back.   I remember well my Dad poking fun at my Mom for reading “bodice rippers” back in the eighties.  Personally…I still love a good bodice ripper.  Hello…Natasha Blackthorne. 

I despise that term by the way, ”Mom porn”…not bodice rippers.  That’s an awesome term.  I’m a firm believer in the integrity of a good bodice ripper.  Not everyone can write a good one though.  I would be interested in Abigail Owen having a go.  Maybe she will one day. 

Anyhoo…

So, I acknowledge that expecting men and women to maintain certain standards of beauty in order to be considered sexy and appealing is wrong. I believe that encouraging these character types to be considered models on which to base our own real actual lives and relationships is…daft. 

It’s not real.  Neither are male model/personal trainer looking fireman dragon shifters who are also chivalrous yet vulnerable loveable yet hard assed hero devil may care magical ethereal gazed crime solvers fantasy husband material. 

But it is a fun, well crafted paranormal romance read in a sea of others intended to base their appeal on “hot guys or hot ladies.”  Rather than basing it on world building, character and story.  The hot thing is just a really cool bonus. 

This actually accomplishes what great paranormal romance is supposed to do: suspension of disbelief, getting drawn into a world, seeing it unfold, rooting for the characters, being interested in what will happen next, accepting the fantasy, escaping for just a little while, putting a smile on our face and making our hearts race. 

In reading characters who are beautiful outside as well as in, going on a journey some might dismiss as frivolous guilty pleasure…I had a really good time.  Thanks Abigail.