We were meant to be, everyone knew it. He called it fated mates, I called it soul mates. My family was wary of me becoming a werewolf, but I knew everything would be perfect after he delivered a life-changing bite.
The problem is there's a one in a million chance of a new werewolf being an alpha. And guess what? I just won the freaking lottery.
Now, my supposed mate can't stand the sight of me. I'm lost, shattered, and confused. With new instincts and a drive to protect, I'm trying my best to stay out from the bottom of a bottle. There's no such thing as a happy lone wolf and I'm struggling to find a place to fit in.
Enter the Army. Turns out they're recruiting werewolves for a new special unit at the nearby base. With my human family withdrawn and my ex's pack trying to hunt me down, there's no time like the present to get out of town.
In the blink of an eye, I'm in boot camp and pushing myself to the edge every day. Tired as I am, I can't stop thinking about the gorgeous secret omega drill sergeant who only has eyes for me. Even better, there's a handsome beta coaching me through the cold, lonely nights. If we get caught, we're all in deep trouble.
Riley has a wonderful future mapped out for her. She’s going to be turned into a werewolf by her lover, become an omega for his pack, then get married and have pups after she finishes her nursing degree. Except the ranking test is wrong and when she turns into an alpha wolf her new pack turns on her.
After being hunted by the pack after they fail to kill her, being shunned by her human parents, and finding danger at every turn she tried to find a way out and ends up enlisting. In Basic, she has to learn how to be a soldier at the same time she learns to be a werewolf in a hostile environment.
This book is quite intense and people who have emotional difficulties that can be triggered by reading scenes of violent assault and attempted sexual assault should approach this book with care.
There’s a lot to enjoy about this book. Riley is a strong character dealing with an exceptionally difficult set of circumstances. She tries to do her best but keeps getting punished for her existence. She fights with heart and strength and keeps getting back up again and faces her opponents with dignity.
I really liked Shawn, the omega drill Sargent with a prosthetic limb, who battles for his recruits with all the strength and determination of an alpha, despite his pack ranking. I respect that he fights his attraction to his recruit and continues to do his best to train his recruits to keep safe when they are posted to their new units.
Hunter annoyed me, as he was a cocky mischief-maker, who kept dragging Riley into trouble. However, he did try to look out for Riley in his own way.
What I had a problem with was the hostile environment the shifters within the army were subject to. The way they were treated as second class citizens. It grated on me and infuriated me, as I’m sure it was supposed to. It just made me tense throughout reading the entire book and it meant I couldn’t relax into it enough to really enjoy reading it.
This book very much felt like an introduction to a series. Nothing really got resolved, it all felt like a set up for something to come in the future. It probably would annoy me less if the next book was already out.
I feel like I would have enjoyed this book a lot more if I was reading it at any other time than at this moment in history. There is so much tension and darkness in the world that I’m looking for relaxing reading matter, and this just wasn’t. It was well written and the characters were engaging. The world-building was well thought out and I’m sure the plot is going somewhere interesting. However, I just couldn’t relax enough to really enjoy it. When the next book comes out, I’ll probably re-read it and enjoy it a lot more.
I spoke to Katelyn and she is aware there is an issue with the file. She’s working hard to get it fixed with Amazon. I’m sure you can agree what you’ve read was great, so maybe, so as not to negatively affect her, hold off on reviewing with low marks until the file is fixed and you can read the rest of the story?
*** Read in Kindle Unlimited *** After dealing with the fiasco that was done on release day the book was finally fixed so any reviews that you read before January 10 are not valid. This book pulled me in and boy oh boy Riley is such a great character. There is just so much she has to face in the short time after she is turned and she is trying to make the best of it. I can not wait to read more of this series and see what happens with Hunter and Sergeant Warner
Quite enjoyed this- clearly I got a fixed copy from some of the other reviews but yeah I enjoyed this :-) awesome characters, interesting plot. Will be good to see what happens
I wanted to love this book so bad! I got it on release day and read the first 87 pages that weekend, and then got the rest when the kindle version was fixed (the author was great about it). But in the end it was just okay.
What worked: The premise - a woman gets turned into a wolf shifter for love, but it goes horribly wrong when her mate rejects her alpha status. With nowhere else to go, she joins the Army in an all-shifter unit.
The Setting - What better place for a newly minted alpha b*tch to cut her teeth than a basic training unit full of shifters?
Hunter - The goofy beta who has a big heart, not a lot of brains, and lots of shifter knowledge.
What didn’t work: -Riley never grew up. I was disappointed in the lack of character development we saw in the main character. For an Alpha, she seemed to really only be a bystander in her own life. By the end of the book, I was hoping to see her really stand up for herself and her team, and she didn’t.
-Attempted rape as a plot point. Maybe I have just read too many books lately that use rape and attempted rape as a plot device, but I’m kind of sick of it. In my opinion, rape for the character development of women is kind of grasping. But then to have it happen numerous times to the same supposedly alpha character, and she never even tells her supposed mates about it?
-The relationship between Riley and the guys. I just wasn’t feeling it. I feel like I was being told, not shown, that something was developing between them. But to be honest, even at the end, it seemed they were still kind of stuck at friend zone. Plus, the book was no-burn, no sex for Riley, and I was not expecting that.
Maybe my expectations were too high? Maybe I just went in with some baggage? I enjoyed the book, it was fine, but I didn’t love it. I will probably still read the next one though. If nothing else, just to see if Riley finally gets laid.
DNF @60%. I really wanted to like the book, but the FMC was annoying me. On the one hand, she is alpha and has these Wild protective instincts that she doesn't understand. On the other hand, she is human, betrayed by her mate and thrust into military life that fuck with her instincts. This should be a great story, but rather make the best of both sides, she actually combines the worst. She doesn't understand her wolf, but also refuses the opportunity offered by the military to learn more. So yeah, she loses my sympathy... I see where this story could go to, but I just cant make it there.
This is the first book I read by Beckett, but it won’t be the last. Riley is excited to be getting mates by her boyfriend, but when she is turned they are horrified she is an alpha and try to kill her. When she doesn’t die, she ends up running as they come back for her, and the only safe place to hide is the military, or is it? I really liked Riley, Shawn, and Hunter. Shawn is not your typical omega, and Hunter is a fun loving, trouble causing beta. I really like their dynamics, and can’t wait to see more of their story :)
It was a great start but randomly ended with no ending just in the middle of a sentence. I was enjoying the characters and the book and would read more just confused by that needing mid sentence.
Rushed. Confusing. Incomplete. Literally ends in the middle of a word. I almost DNF'd but pushed through until the last sentence which wasn't even finished. So many unanswered questions...
The book ends in the middle of a sentence.... If you ignore the bad spelling ie she went to the Shoppe or stupid stuff whereby words slightly wrong, it's really enjoyable.. Just don't know why it's not a full book????