I do not like shifter books but story had me laughing right to the very end. Great characters and a quirky story. ( )

I have decided that if there is anything to reincarnation I am coming back as a dog and I am diffidently moving to Mad Creek, California! What a super cute, sweet story this turned out to be. I hope the rest of the year's reads are like this. It's a warm, emotional, story that is filled with gentle humor. Meet Lance: He's the sheriff in human form and Pack leader of the "Quickended" in his doggie form. He takes both roles very seriously...maybe too much so. As a result, he's intense, socially inept to say the least, and not much fun at all. Fun? What's that? He has no time for it. The pack has a monthly "Howl at the Moon" on the full moon, no time for that either. Nothing and no one can deter him from his job. You have to remember that he is mostly Border Collie, so what would you expect? No sir...he has a pack and an entire town to protect. No way will he trust his duties to anyone else...especially if they aren't "pack". Now we meet Tim who is SOOO NOT PACK.

Tim just wants a place to hide and lick his wounds, a place to prove that he is none of the terrible, hurtful things that both his father and his former boss said to him. Instead of the quiet place he so badly needed he found that he had been sniffed out by the cold, wet nose of the sheriff. He found Tim to be more than mildly suspicious and less than lacking in every way... just as everyone else in his life had always found him. Tim had a "magic" with vegetables that had suddenly disappeared, and Tim was determined not to let hunger, lack of sufficient funds, the proper tools, or nosy town in either people or doggie form, keep him from getting it back. What he didn't count on was making a new canine friend, some plants mysteriously going missing and the tenacity of the sheriff...or, Heaven forbid... his mother!

It's not your standard M/M Romance or your usual shifter story. How to Howl at the Moon is a perfect, quirky, sometimes funny, feel-good romance and the absolutely perfect start to the New Year's reads. ( )

2,5 stars

What's innovative in this story, to me at least, is that it present the shifting in a contrary direction than majority of shifter stories, dogs are who, at a time in their lives -or during an ancestor's life- become humans.

But I found this book built with a certain amount of neglect:
* The lability and uncertainty about the causes for a first shifting don't accord too much with a shifter species with a structure.
* Putting marijuana dealers in a role that I would expect more in cocaine cartels provokes that this aspect seems exaggerated and hard to believe.
* I was confused with the first encounter between MCs, due to the somewhat erratic behavior and words from Tim I got the impression that he was a weredog too.

But perhaps what more diminished my enjoyment is that I didn't feel any chemistry between Tim and Lance when at last they came together.

On the good side, I liked Tim & Chance moments and all stuff related to horticulture. But neither that nor Ms. Easton fresh humor -that I love- were able to move this book from an "OK" to a "Like" for me.

Even so, I intend to read the next book in the series, the blurb is intriguing enough and hey, is Eli Easton, OK? ( )

Review forthcoming ( )

Oh man, this was so delightful! I totally did not expect that.
And it was slow-burn. Do you know how rare that is?
Pretty good story. Delightful characters. Did I mention slow-burn?
Heed me swooning, people!

I'm SO reading about Roman next! ( )