Fun, light, sexy. ( )

Widows Auction 2 stars
Luisa's Desire 3 stars
Mr. Speedy 4 stars
The Awakening 2.5 stars ( )

If you have read one shifter romance novel -- no matter the author -- you have read most shifter novels in the genre. This series is no different. Brain candy fluff for clearing my head. Easy to read. Not a lot of commitment required. ( )

The fantasy theme was heavy with all four of the stories in the book. The first story is The Widow's Auction by Sabrina Jeffries. In this novella, a young widow is convinced that it is in her favor to auction off one night with her in return for a large sum of money that she can use to benefit her work with a all-boys' school. Of course, she secretly just wants to know what it's like to actually enjoy the bedtime act. In the realm of make-believe, this was quite the enjoyable mix of lust and romance with no negative consequences.
The second story is Luisa's Desire by Emma Holly. In this fascinating read, an immortal woman seeks an alternative to her need for blood to survive in a remote lamasery buried in the Himalayan mountains of Tibet. While she assumes that the answer is a particular form of meditation, what she instead gets is an aspiring monk who possesses a much more fleshly solution to her problem. Reincarnation takes on a whole new meaning in this short story, and I found the different take on vampires in fiction to be well-written.
The third story is Mr. Speedy by Elda Minger. In this plot, an ambitious young woman decides to make herself over into a man in order to sneak into and cover a male-only conference entirely about getting a woman to go to bed with the man. Her genius plan takes a left-turn when she discovers she is rooming with the city's most eligible bachelor coming off of a horrid divorce - whom she is overwhelmingly attracted to. The irony of this story is that the bachelor becomes increasingly interested in her before he is even aware she is in disguise. The humor of this story made it quite charming in a sexy sort of way.
The final story is The Awakening by Christine Feehan. The story begins her series, the Leopard People, with the tale of a young veterinarian lured deep into the jungle to track down her inheritance. Heavy lust and desire take over quite early in the story as the reader discovers that her presence there has been manipulated by a man of the leopard people who has already claimed her for his mate. The intensity and over-dramatization in the writing made this story less enjoyable for me than the others. I was also put off by the man's extreme obsession with the woman and his reluctance to tell her what was happening to her right from the beginning. ( )

TBR

First story was pretty standard woman-wears-a-mask-but-man-recognizes-her-anyway romance. The execution was fine.

Completely skipped the second story after the first few pages; it just wasn't doing it for me.

Third and fourth weren't very memorable, which is disappointing as the fourth was the Christine Feehan story and I generally enjoy her. This was just ho hum. Imminently skippable. ( )

A couple of stories seemed nice and compact in the area they were given - I don't think anything could be gained by making them longer. The other two seemed like they were just the naughty bits picked out of a much longer story and the "romance" was just ridiculous. Christine Feehan's story was actually my least favorite of the 4. ( )

A book of short stories all involving seduction. I really enjoyed three of the stories but one left me a little flat. I also for some reason didn't expect two stories to have supernatural aspects (vampires and were leopards) while the other two were a historical story (although a little unrealistic for the era in my mind) and a modern day piece. They all were fun and had decent 'dirty' bits in them but I doubt any of them are anything I will remember years from now. Fun escapism but nothing earth shattering. ( )

I found all the stories in this anthology readable, but the Christine Feehan story, "The Awakening" was set in a location that's not a favorite of mine. Still very entertaining. ( )

http://www.xanga.com/booksa1000/617441220/fantasy.html ( )

'The Awakening' by Feehan was a good kick off for her leopard people series (continued with Wild Rain). Emma Holly did a very fine job with her lady upyr in 'Luisa's Desire', with quite a twist on the vampire line. ( )

Leopard short story. It's the last story in the book. I don't remember if the others are worth reading. ( )

3.5 stars ( )