Review Post : Hot & Badgered – Shelly Laurenston

Hot and Badgered by Shelly Laurenston
Published by Kensington on 2018-03-27
Genres: Paranormal, Shifters
Pages: 400
Format: eBook
Goodreads

It’s not every day that a beautiful naked woman falls out of the sky and lands face-first on grizzly shifter Berg Dunn’s hotel balcony. Definitely they don’t usually hop up and demand his best gun. Berg gives the lady a grizzly-sized t-shirt and his cell phone, too, just on style points. And then she’s gone, taking his XXXL heart with her. By the time he figures out she’s a honey badger shifter, it’s too late.

Honey badgers are survivors. Brutal, vicious, ill-tempered survivors. Or maybe Charlie Taylor-MacKilligan is just pissed that her useless father is trying to get them all killed again, and won’t even tell her how. Protecting her little sisters has always been her job, and she’s not about to let some pesky giant grizzly protection specialist with a network of every shifter in Manhattan get in her way. Wait. He’s trying to help? Why would he want to do that? He’s cute enough that she just might let him tag along—that is, if he can keep up .

FTC : I got this from NetGalley for a fair and honest review.

Hash-tags : #shape-shifters #romance #PNR #Badgers #Funny #snark

I requested the book because of the author. I have adored Shelly Laurenston for an eon and all her books are fabulously funny. She writes ridiculously out there heroines who are brimming with snark and, although they can be silly, the books have never failed to make me laugh.

This book focuses on three criminal, honey-badger sisters who are trying to survive whatever ridiculous situation their dead-beat father throws their way. Their family doesn’t accept them due to their hybrid natures, their community struggle with them as honey-badger hybrids had never been seen before so they had only each other to rely on.

This book centers around Charlie, the big sister with the responsibilities of protecting her genius sister from the world and protecting the world from her sociopath sister. Throughout the book, she has to navigate these duties whilst protecting them all from their awful Father (he really is awful). There is a whole heap of world-building to do setting up the back story of these sisters, which means, unfortunately, the romance content is limited however it does mean this book is absolutely amazing. I really enjoyed dipping into the bear/honey-badger world – and it’s always fun to see familiar favorites (Cella and Dee-Ann are in here – I love these two!).

The male protagonist in this book is Berg, the bear shifter. A triplet, he is used to being around siblings, so he is the perfect mate for Charlie who is heavily attached to her siblings (they are a package deal). Charlie drops in his lap (naked) and he can’t stop thinking about her after that. He is deceptively easygoing but that all stops when it comes to protecting Charlie! I loved how perceptive he was when he came to her and her needs. Berg is a fabulous beta hero and I adored him.

The only thing that was a little disappointing was the romance. There just wasn’t enough space for everything in the book and this was the thing that got cut. It did leave more space for the fantastic female friendships in there though so I can’t complain too much!

I really enjoyed this book! It was bonkers but I feel, as the series has continued, the characters have become fully fleshed and more relatable. I loved the new world but, secretly, I also loved seeing the old faces in a new setting (Kyle!). I can’t wait to read more!