Christine Feehan: LEOPARD SERIES

Author: Christine Feehan

Series: LEOPARD SERIES (SMR)

Ratings: V4, S4, H2

Publishers and Titles:

     Fever (Berkley, 2006, reprint: contains both the novella, “The Awakening,” and the novel, Wild Rain)

     Wild Rain (Jove, 2004)
     Burning Wild (Jove, 2009)

     Wild Fire (Jove, 2010)

     Savage Nature (Jove, 2011)

     The newest book in the series (Savage Nature) is reviewed near the end of this synopsis of the series so far:

     This series tells the stories of a group of shape-shifting leopards, with locales ranging from the jungles of Borneo and Panama to the wide-open country of the American West to the swamps of Cajun country.

     Each male shifter meets and romances his soul mate as they fight off a series of predators, both human and supernatural. Angst levels are always high as a result of self-doubt, distrust, and miscommunications between each pair of lovers. Generally, each heroine is approaching the Han Vol Dan, a sexual awakening that occurs in young leopard-shifter females in this world. The series has been republished in a variety of media, including print, audio, and e-book.

     In Wild Rain, Rachel Lospostros, a naturalist, hides from a mysterious and dangerous assassin in the rain forests of Borneo, where she meets up with Rio Santana, one of the leopard people. The couple realizes that they are meant for one another, but Rio has dark secrets and Rachel is approaching an awakening that she doesn't really understand.

     In Burning Wild, Jake Bannaconni, another of the leopards, finally turns his back on his cruel and manipulative family and strikes out on his own on a ranch in Texas that was left to him by his grandfather. The early sections that detail the abuses of Jake's childhood are very graphic, in a stomach-turning sort of way. Since Jake has had difficulty with shifting (which was a huge bone of contention with his family), he goes off to the Borneo rain forest to find his heritage. There he meets several of the men who become part of his team (and stars of future books in the series). Back in the U.S., Jake gets involved with the pregnant Emma Reynolds, and they begin to fall in love. Since both the hero and the heroine have loads of unresolved issues from their pasts, the plot is extremely complex, but worth the effort to sort it all out.

     In Wild Fire, Conner Vega, yet another leopard shifter, is a native of the Panama rain forest. His soul mate turns out to be Isabeau Chandler, a Borneo shifter with whom he has had a failed relationship in the past. Although they know that they are true mates, they have remained apart—until now.

     In Savage Nature, Sari Boudreaux has grown up wild in the swamps of Louisiana Cajun country. She knows that her brothers are leopard shifters, but they don't know that she has discovered their secret. When Sari finds several murdered men in the swamp, she notifies the owner of the land about the problem, and that owner turns out to be Jake Bannaconni from Burning Wild. Jake sends Drake Donovan, his top investigator (and one of the friends he made in Borneo), to Louisiana to find out what's going on. You can guess what happens next.

    

     In each book, the story centers on the rise of the mating heat in the heroine, which tends to drive all males in the vicinity absolutely crazy. Each female heroine must mate with the male hero and then go on to solve the mystery posed in each plot. The male dominance and female submission can be a bit off-putting, but if you can get past that, the stories are told in Feehan's usual spell-binding manner.

     Christine Feehan is always a great story-teller, and she always includes lots of passionate (frequently raw) sex between the lead characters. Although the villain can usually be spotted by the reader a few chapters before he or she is unveiled on the page, the plots are still compelling. Each character, of course, has plenty of reason for many angst-filled interior monologues, mostly from terrible childhoods, but also from crippling self-esteem issues. I don't need to tell you much more than that. You've probably read some of Feehan's CARPATHIAN /DARK books, so you know that she's the real deal when it comes to paranormal romance.