Book Review: Coveted by Shawntelle Madison

Coveted by Shawntelle Madison is a novel for adults, and young adults, that speaks about mental illness in a fresh new way. Natalya Stravinsky is a werewolf with a broken heart, and who feels broken in a much larger way. She calls herself a collector, but in reality is a hoarder. She is obsessively clean, and has a special love for Christmas ornaments. She was not always like this, but events that broke her heart and brought her to be an outcast of the pack have exasperated her urges, and she is a little out of control. Now complications are starting to pile up faster than the ornaments, as a rival pack brings danger close to home, Nat's ex boyfriend returns, an old friend comes to stay, and a return to therapy brings new connections and surprises.

I really fell into the world of Nat and Coveted. She loves her family, friends, and pack but is often insulted and typically outright mistreated or ignored because of her strange habits. She has found a job that soothes her need to organize and be in control, but the chaos of life often bring on urges to search out new items for her collection. Even those with no mental illness, or lacking a close connection to someone with one, can relate to that need for some level of control when life seems to spin out of control. The explanation of how it feels to have compulsive urges and to face them, is something many readers need to understand simply to understand others they will encounter in life, and Coveted handles it with honesty and compassion.

Oh, and then there is the supernatural component to Coveted. The werewolf hierarchy is not new, readers of paranormal novels will already have an understanding of how it works, and it holds true here. However, I greatly enjoyed the inclusion of other supernatural creatures. I always found it silly to write about one type of supernatural creature with dismissing the idea that if one exists, it is likely that there are even more possibilities out there. The introduction of a wide variety of supernaturals, and the open possibilities of more being out there, makes the world Nat lives in feel even more realistic to me.

I highly recommend Coveted to readers that enjoy a well written paranormal or urban fantasy novel, but are tired of reading ones that all feel the same. Readers with mental illness, or close to someone with one, will have even more to love about Coveted as it gives an honest look at compulsive urges and the true humanity of those so often ignored or shunned by other people.