I’m pretty good at suspending reality when reading a book in an Alternate Universe, but I had some trouble with that in this particular instance.
The premise is that shape shifters hunted humans into near extinction hundreds of years ago and the remaining humans hid deep in the parts of the world the shape shifters left alone, the most rugged terrain, high in the mountains, deep in the wilderness… The problem is, the shape shifters all shape shift into animals. Animals that live in all of those wilderness type places. Humans live in cities. Humans group together for safety. Yet in the premise of this book, the humans who are hunted to near extinction, somehow find each other and then break into small groups to hide in the wilderness while the beasts/shape shifters grouped together in cities and develop technology the same way humans would have? Eventually give up letting their beasts rule and mostly now feel bad for making humans extinct, because they don’t know about the humans that are still hiding. The humans that are now reduced to a hunter gatherer type society. Humans that are slowly dying out because as the beasts civilization spreads out, it forces the humans further into the wilderness that none of the shape shifters a live-in.
I would think that if shape shifters ruled the world, that they would be big on protecting the earth and the wildlife. I would think that technology would have developed in much different ways and that civilizations spreading would not have as great an impact on the environment as human civilizations have.
I would think that there would have originally been a reason that the shape shifters hunted the humans to near extinction. Yet that aspect is only hinted at and it’s an accepted fact in shifter society that their ancestors wiped out an entire species.
I didn’t have nearly as much trouble with the premise when I started reading, because I assumed that as the author progressed through the book, the premise would be explained, not just accepted. Unfortunately I was wrong about that. Oh so very wrong.
I think if I had been right about that, I would have enjoyed the book far more. But so much of it just didn’t make any logical sense. And I’m not just talking about the premise. The choices the characters made, also quite frequently didn’t make any sense. Especially when there didn’t seem to be any reason for the decision/fear/happiness/whatever.
I do believe that this book had great potential, but I don’t personally feel that it met that potential and I will not be continuing in the series.