Alaska Hunt

By: Shelter Somerset

Narrated by: John Solo

For Alaska Wildlife Trooper Zanebono Fusca, it's just another summer in Anchorage until a slew of inexplicable fatal bear attacks sets the city reeling. As far as Zane is concerned, the timing couldn't be worse. He's besieged with his own demons, coping with personal loss and an identity crisis that clutches him worse than a grizzly's pickaxe-sized fangs. Ten years before, he hoped Alaska would bring him a sense of his manhood. Now the "last frontier" could put him in an early grave.

Zane's role to protect Alaska's teeming wildlife gets even more tangled when handsome 25-year-old Joshua Gaffner arrives seeking the details of his uncle's gruesome death. But Alaskan officials have few answers. Against his better judgment, Zane takes Joshua deep into Anchorage's far-flung back country - populated with eccentric recluses and ego-driven ecologists - in search of the truth. As the bizarre attacks increase, Zane and Josh continue to push for clues to crack the mystery. Finally Zane unravels a shocking discovery that makes the pieces fall into place. The trouble is Josh stands in the perfect position to become the next victim.

©2012 Shelter Somerset (P)2016 Dreamspinner Press

Narrator saved it

Any additional comments?

My first by this author, and while I found it very detailed and informative, the characters especially Joshua I found too annoying to really enjoy the overall story.

Zane and in turn Joshua become the main MC of this story when Joshua barges his way into Zane’s life and work when he doesn’t believe the finally report on his uncles death.

As the story unfolds, these two discover that more is happening to these bears and they are determined to find out. As well as discover a budding relationship that can’t possibly work when they live so far away.

Zane and Joshua, what can you say. Two people, no chemistry fighting for the same cause of sorts. One is fighting demons from a marriage, an accident and unresolved issues. The other, clearly has anger issues from a father that doesn’t want to accept him. But they manage to get together, figure out that in fact something is happening and not die. And keep a relationship going. Putting those two aside, giving ‘voices’ to the bears as they feel the effects and commit the crimes/killing because of the drugs was a unique experience, not sure I want to repeat.

What was truly amazing was the detail we received about Alaska, bears and the jobs these people do. Makes you have a new appreciation for the true wildness and the people that have to deal with it.

Narration, John once again showed us his true talent as a narrator.

Narration was good; story wasn't for me.

Any additional comments?

This seemed like a well researched story, and it's certainly full of intense moments, it has both human and animal perspectives and enjoyable narration.

The story just didn't work for me, which sometime happens and I'm putting this squarely down to "it's not you, it's me."

The bears were a little too anthropomorphized, I found the pace of the story too slow, the "romance" lacked the heat and romantic elements I was looking for and needed to offset the mystery, and the mystery itself didn't draw me in.

However, the one thing that I did enjoy was the narration. John Solo does a good job with the different angles of the story, he has strong character voices and his pacing was good.

The rest just wasn't for me.

Interesting Mystery

That was a highly unusual romance novel for me. Focused mainly on the mystery of the bears - sections even are told from the bears' points of view - it's an interesting story, just a bit involved.

The positive was that John Solo does a really nice performance. He builds the excitement as the story progresses, and kept my interest as well as anyone possibly could have done.

This book was a total. waste of time!

Struggled to finish this book. The narration was awful. found myself bored to tears. Awful .