Stray (Shifters #1) by Rachel Vincent

There are only eight breeding female werecats left... And I'm one of them.
I look like an all-American grad student. But I am a werecat, a shape-shifter, and I live in two worlds.
Despite reservations from my family and my Pride, I escaped the pressure to continue my species and carved out a normal life for myself. Until the night a Stray attacked.
I'd been warned about Strays--werecats without a Pride, constantly on the lookout for someone like me: attractive, female, and fertile. I fought him off, but then learned two of my fellow tabbies had disappeared.
This brush with danger was all my Pride needed to summon me back...for my own protection. Yeah, right. But I'm no meek kitty. I'll take on whatever--and whoever--I have to in order to find my friends. Watch out, Strays--'cause I got claws and I'm not afraid to use them...
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Okay, so while I was busy making false promises to myself and saying I wasn't going to get hooked on yet another book series, I was busy falling in love with Stray. Seriously, this book had all I could ever ask for: a complicated love triangle; a smart-ass, kick-ass heroine; a huge amount of hot guys; tons of suspense and action; a sexy, in-your-face writing style; a paranormal twist; and an ending that made me pull out a couple of my own hairs. Maybe I'm in a great mood, but every page was a cliffhanger in itself and every chapter was like its own short story. Faythe (whose name I loved) is so hilarious and so sarcastic I was laughing out loud every time I wasn't biting my nails at the nonstop action. Marc, the sweetheart, left me aching so badly for my own ferociously hot, muscular, funny... Okay, I'll stop drooling. I loved Jace, too, even when he got a bit annoying and seemed a bit, shall I say, ardent in his sudden affections. Who doesn't love a good love triangle? Anyways, while the action and romance were fantastic, I had a few complaints, my main being that Faythe was a little bit of a big talker. She acted like she was tougher than she proved, until about 400 pages in. Maybe I'm being picky, but for all her big talk, she sure needed a lot of rescuing. Another thing: near the end of the novel her affections were suddenly set in stone, and I was a little shocked that she had so suddenly made her decision, seeing as for the first half she seemed to be so convinced she wanted a completely independent life. Lastly, the ending got really graphic. I'm a horror movie fan, don't get me wrong, and I love some good, old-fashioned gore, but the graphicness seemed kind of random in the book. I don't know, maybe it served its purpose, and while I didn't blink at the grotesque description, I thought some readers might have been a little more disgusted and maybe even turned off. I just found it unnecessary. Anyways, great book, and I'm definitely getting Rogue as soon as humanly possible.
4.5 stars and a recommendation to adventure-romance (is that even a genre?) fans or readers looking for a kick-ass first novel to a promising series.