Touch a Dark Wolf by Jennifer St. Giles

[K Venne]

This is the first book in the Shadowmen Series.

The author takes us on a thrilling and romantic journey about Erin (a nurse) who works for a big medical company and a Shadow Hunter named Jared who has been fatally wounded and must now live as a mortal while searching for a way to cure the poison or be doomed to turn into a monster.

Erin has just made a gruesome discovery at the lab where she works and is quickly learning that there is a lot more going on behind the scenes, and that the company and her boss are not who they appear to be.

Due to Erin’s discovery she is now on the run from her employer, but she also wants to figure out what is really going on. While on the run she encounters a strange man named Jared after her car is run off the road. Erin finds Jared to be quite unusual in his behaviour and the things he says. His words and actions would sometimes give off a “cave-man” and delusional feel, so she doesn’t know what to make of him and is slow to trust him. Jared does tries to explain to Erin who he is but she constantly refuses to believe him. I sometimes found Erin’s stubbornness to believe Jared quite irritating, considering all the evidence displayed before her. It is believable though that she would have a hard time accepting the truth.

Erin’s reluctance to believe Jared seems to be a theme within the book, not just with her but with other characters within the story. There seems to be a constant struggle between those who embrace things like psychics, sixth senses etc, and then there are the skeptics who believe that those people are ridiculous and silly and those people need cold hard facts and don’t believe in anything supernatural or from other worlds.

I found that the author likes to lessen the tension in some of the scenes with Jared’s character. I would actually laugh out loud or giggle with some of his actions or things that he would say. It was refreshing and made me enjoy his character.

Considering this is classified as a sci-fi novel, I found that the entire story didn’t revolve around this aspect; it was just a “part” of the story which blended really well.

I would definitely recommend this series and I look forward to reading the next books. However due to the sexual nature of the story I would recommend this series to adults only.

I would rate this book a 3 out of 4 stars.