Shadowfever by Karen Marie Moning (audio)

Book Description:
“Evil is a completely different creature, Mac. Evil is bad that believes it’s good.”

MacKayla Lane was just a child when she and her sister, Alina, were given up for adoption and banished from Ireland forever.  Twenty years later, Alina is dead and Mac has returned to the country that expelled them to hunt her sister’s murderer. But after discovering that she descends from a bloodline both gifted and cursed, Mac is plunged into a secret history: an ancient conflict between humans and immortals who have lived concealed among us for thousands of years.

What follows is a shocking chain of events with devastating consequences, and now Mac struggles to cope with grief while continuing her mission to acquire and control the Sinsar Dubh a book of dark, forbidden magic scribed by the mythical Unseelie King, containing the power to create and destroy worlds.

In an epic battle between humans and Fae, the hunter becomes the hunted when the Sinsar Dubh turns on Mac and begins mowing a deadly path through those she loves.

Who can she turn to? Who can she trust? Who is the woman haunting her dreams? More important, who is Mac herself and what is the destiny she glimpses in the black and crimson designs of an ancient tarot card.

At last, the grand finale - the answers to all our questions!  Who was it that Mac killed at the end of Dreamfever?  Who was the beast?  Will she and Barrons ever kiss and make up and admit they love one another?  What is Barrons, anyway?  Is he even human?  How does Mac get out of the mirrors?  Will she ever see Christian again?  Will Mac ever find out who her mother really is?  The questions could go on and on and yes, they are all answered, although I was a bit disappointed that we didn't get a real clear cut answer about what Barrons really is... 

It's hard to review this book without giving away any spoilers, so this is going to be brief.  Shadowfever picks up right where Dreamfever leaves off.   We suffer with Mac as she realizes who the beast was and who she has killed.  But, she picks up the pieces, becomes stronger and more determined than ever to save the world from the Unseelies, double cross and kill Daroc and harness the power of the Sinsar Dubh and use it to make everything right again.  Not an easy task.

On audio, I enjoyed listening, but this was by far the most complex and wordy of the books in the series.  It's definitely worthy of a re-read (in print) to really get a handle on all the explanations.  Plus, it was so complicated I just need to read it again to get it all straight in my head!  There was a lot of background information to digest, lots of Fae lore, a who's who of Fae prince's, fallen prince's, former queens, the concubine.  Who was the Unseelie King, really?  Many red herrings - it was a roller coaster ride of emotions, yet there is a lot of reassuring familiarity in the book.  Barrons is around, he and Mac are forever snarling at one another, never admitting their true feelings - but of course they do eventually!  We find out what the real reason is behind Barron's search for the Sinsar Dubh, and I found it wasn't what I expected at all, it was a surprise to me and, dare I say - I bit of a let down *ducking*.

Did I like the book?  Yes, of course, but it's not my favorite in the series.  Darkfever still holds that honor.  Did it live up to all my expectations?  Yes, but there's still some unfinished business left up in the air and I felt that the ending was a bit open-ended.  I can't say I'm perfectly satisfied with it.  I had trouble with the sappy ending, which I found to be somewhat uncharacteristic of the overall tone of the series.  It felt like someone put a cherry and whipped cream on top of a very rare sirloin steak.   The whole, life is great, Betty Crocker "let's play house" and "steaks on the BBQ" scene was over the top.  Huh?  It just didn't sit right with me.    For some reason I just felt a bit deflated after it was all over, but at the same time, I'm happy for everyone and everything got resolved.

On a side note, I've been listening to the Highlander Series for the first time.  I've read it before, but never on audio.  Phil Gigante is amazing!  His voice for Adam Black, in particular, is sinful!  Plus, now I can pick up on the many references and clues for the Fever Series that meant nothing to me my first time around with the McKeltar brothers.

Speaking of the Keltar, I loved the McKeltar's showing up and oozing masculinity and tangling with Barrons.  He hated them!  I thought it was a hoot! We even have a brief cameo of Adam Black - and it sizzled!  We even see some old creepy unseelie's again like the "gray woman".  It kinda reminded me of the Seinfeld finale.  We get glimpses of some of our old favorites who all come back for the last episode, but the episode itself is a bit of a let down - or at least that's how I felt about it at the time.  I recently watched it again and loved it!  I bet I feel that way with Shadowfever too, I have to give it some time before a re-read when I will savor it slowly, mull it over and soak it up.

Overall, Fever is a fantastic series, amazingly imaginative and downright awesome! One of my absolute favorites and I'm sure I will revisit Mac again and again.  When I do re-read Shadowfever, I'll add a postscript to my review here.

4/5

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Fever... you give me fever... Karen Marie Moning

You give me fever,
When you kiss me,
Fever when you hold me tight.
Fever! In the morning,
Fever all through the night.

This post has lots of spoilers in it. I just could not write my thoughts on this fantastic series otherwise. You'll also have to deal with my fevered stream of consciousness that will only make sense to anyone who has read this series, I apologize in advance

Has it really been less than two weeks since I first started reading Darkfever? I feel like I've been sleepwalking through my life, just living to read, read, read. I haven't been so engrossed in a new series since the first time I read Outlander And you know what that led to!


BLOODFEVER

Book Description:
I used to think my sister and I were just two nice southern girls who’d get married in a few years and settle down to a quiet life. Then I discovered that Alina and I descend, not from good wholesome southern stock, but from an ancient Celtic bloodline of powerful sidhe-seers, people who can see the Fae. Not only can I see the terrifying otherworldly race, but I can sense the sacred Fae relics that hold the deadliest of their magic.

When my sister was found dead in a trash-filled alley in Dublin, I came over to get answers. Now all I want is revenge. And after everything I’ve learned about myself, I know I have the power to get it….

MacKayla Lane’s ordinary life underwent a complete makeover when she landed on Ireland’s shores and was plunged into a world of deadly sorcery and ancient secrets.

In her fight to stay alive, Mac must find the Sinsar Dubh–a million-year-old book of the blackest magic imaginable, which holds the key to power over both the worlds of the Fae and of Man. Pursued by Fae assassins, surrounded by mysterious figures she knows she cannot trust, Mac finds herself torn between two deadly and irresistible men: V’lane, the insatiable Fae who can turn sensual arousal into an obsession for any woman, and the ever-inscrutable Jericho Barrons, a man as alluring as he is mysterious. For centuries the shadowy realm of the Fae has coexisted with that of humans. Now the walls between the two are coming down, and Mac is the only thing that stands between them.…

Bloodfever is the 2nd in the Fever series, and continues the tale of Mac and the mysterious and handsome to die for Barrons. I'm developing a major colossal crush on him. I'd say I'm falling for this man - but... I don't know if he's a man or not! Whatever he is - I want him. Mac undergoes her first transformation in this book, she nearly dies and when all is lost, it seems like this is it, she figures out that if she eats Unseelie, she will not die and gets better - and guess who feeds it to her? Uh.. yeah. I don't know what he is, but I want one of my own. Crazy as it might seem, I keep thinking Barrons is what Mr. Darcy would be like in the this crazy, paranormal fae universe. Is it no wonder I'm hot as anything for this guy in leather with his dark handsome good looks. Just the thought of riding around on his silent Harley, turning corners and holding on for dear life - gaaah! (as in a cross between a gasp and "aaah")

Bloodfever wasn't as good to me as Darkfever, but I'm still lovin' it! It's grittier, life is getting tougher, the Unseelie are pouring in, Mac is losing her innocence fast. I'm glad the vampire is out of the picture now, though, and loved that one hot moment between Mac and Barrons - such a teasing duo!

Onto the next...

4/5



FAEFEVER

Book Description:
"He calls me his Queen of the Night. I'd die for him. I'd kill for him, too." When MacKayla Lane receives a torn page from her dead sister's journal, she is stunned by Alina's desperate words. And now MacKayla knows that her sister's killer is close. But evil is closer. And suddenly the sidhe-seer is on the hunt: For answers. For revenge. And for an ancient book of dark magic so evil, it corrupts anyone who touches it.

Mac's quest for the Sinsar Dubh takes her into the mean, shape-shifting streets of Dublin, with a suspicious cop on her tail. Forced into a dangerous triangle of alliance with V'lane, an insatiable Fae prince of lethally erotic tastes, and Jericho Barrons, a man of primal desires and untold secrets, Mac is soon locked in a battle for her body, mind, and soul.

As All Hallows' Eve approaches and the city descends into chaos, as a shocking truth about the Dark Book is uncovered, not even Mac can prevent a deadly race of immortals from shattering the walls between worlds - with devastating consequences...

What a bloody cliffhanger! How did everybody last until the next book came out? All I can say is, I'm glad I didn't have to wait! I liked Faefever better than Bloodfever. Even though things are getting steadily worse and worse I could not stop reading, I'm addicted.

Am I the only one that thinks the sidhe-seers are whiny? I find Dani annoying too, but maybe that's just because I happen to live with a teenager right now. I have to keep telling myself, she's only thirteen.

I'm liking V'lane more and more, but I just don't trust him. Still...

Sorry, not much of a review, I sort of have lumped Bloodfever and Faefever together, though I liked Faefever more. I'm just bowled over how good this is - all the details and characters and weapons and villains and wondering what's what and who's who? It's mind boggling and so clever!! This just blows away her Highlander series!

4.5/5


Never know how much I love you,
Never know how much I care.
When you put your arms around me,
I get a fever that's so hard to bear.

DREAMFEVER

Book Description:
He has stolen her past, but MacKayla will never allow her sister's murderer to take her future. Yet even the uniquely gifted sidhe-seer is no match for the Lord Master, who has unleashed an insatiable sexual craving that consumes Mac's every thought-and thrusts her into the seductive realm of two very dangerous men, both of whom she desires but dares not trust.

As the enigmatic Jericho Barrons and the sensual Fae prince V'lane vie for her body and soul, as cryptic entries from her sister's diary mysteriously appear and the power of the Dark Book weaves its annihilating path through the city, Mac's greatest enemy delivers a final challenge...

It's an invitation Mac cannot refuse, one that sends her racing home to Georgia, where an even darker threat awaits. With her parents missing and the lives of her loved ones under siege, Mac is about to come face-to-face with a soul-shattering truth-about herself and her sister, about Jericho Barrons...and about the world she thought she knew.

Oh God, there was just so much in this book that was hard to take in...

*choke*

O ye of little faith... you didn't even try.

Noooooo! Barrons, Barrons - thank you for saving Mac, but... but... yes, I was so hoping he'd rescue her, but not like this, not this way! To think that they are having non-stop sex over and over again, but she's all Pri-ya and screwed up! It's too fast, it's rushed, it's not slow and sexy! Where's their moment in the sun? Where's their moment to fall in love? Where's that penultimate moment that we've all been waiting for? Instead we're bombarded with sex, sex, sex, but it's not real - although, some things were pretty damn hot - but it has no deep, inner meaning, he's saving her, he's rescuing her. Neither wants to admit there's more to it than that. I want romance, I wanted to slap the two of them up against the head and tell them to say "I love you!" in the abbey! I wanted Mac to go back with him, and V'lane jumping in and interrupting them - aargh! What a choice to make - though I'd choose Barrons any day - still! It's driving me crazy!

*pout*

Still... it's bloody brilliant!

Did I mention how much I loved the description of Barrons and sex, he's amazing! All night long? Never gets tired? Always hard? Gulp! A woman's dream!

I still find Dani annoying, but she did save Mac, and for that I'll be grateful. I know there's more to her than we know, I guess I'm looking forward to her growing up. I am afraid the Unseelie Princes are going to get to her.

I got a little lost in all the cosmic Silvers going from realm to realm and stones and seeing Christian and then losing Christian (!) parts. The inter dimensional explanations of what could be happening - well, you lost me there, though I'm in awe of how KMM can write all this stuff!

Now for the end! Okay, the whole time Mac was being protected by the IYD "thing" monster I kept thinking "It's really Barrons." So? Is it? What do you all think? It just can't be - or if it is, she feeds him that last little piece of Unseelie (I'm not sure she even still has it). He can't be dead! And what happened to V'lane? I'm just so amazed at KMM's imagination! Really, really amazing stuff, I always liked her writing and loved her Highlander series before this, but this just puts her in a whole new class for me - this is really good! Or is it this fever I'm experiencing and I'm just .... uh, forgot what I'm talking about, I'm still in such a daze...

I don't know how in the world I'm going to be able to wait for Shadowfever! And it's been optioned with 20th Century Fox - whoah! But I know that nothing can come of it, Outlander has been optioned a few times with nothing coming of it, so who knows...

Still! It would be awesome!

*I don't even want to think about what Mac as Pri-ya and Barrons bringing her back would be like! Definitely would have to be on cable...*

Out of all the books, I loved Darkfever the best, since that was my intro, but I thought Dreamfever was the most compelling and imaginative of them so far and very, very well done. Brava!

4.5/5

Overall rating of Series: 5/5

Update: November 2, 2010

I've now listened to the whole series on audio now and loved it.  Funnily enough Dreamfever was much easier to listen to than read in print.  I understood it better and loved the sultry masculine voice of Phil Gigante, although I missed the strong Southern accent of Mac as narrated by Joyce Bean.   Dreamfever's new female narrator, Natalie Ross is fine and she sounded like she was in her early twenties, more so than Bean in the earlier books.

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Darkfever by Karen Marie Moning

Book Description:
MacKayla Lane's life is good. She has great friends, a decent job, and a car that breaks down only every other week or so. In other words, she's your perfectly ordinary twenty-first-century woman. Or so she thinks... until something extraordinary happens.

When her sister is murdered, leaving a single clue to her death -– a cryptic message on Mac's cell phone -- Mac journeys to Ireland in search of answers. The quest to find her sister's killer draws her into a shadowy realm where nothing is as it seems, where good and evil wear the same treacherously seductive mask. She is soon faced with an even greater challenge: staying alive long enough to learn how to handle a power she had no idea she possessed -- a gift that allows her to see beyond the world of man, into the dangerous realm of the Fae...

As Mac delves deeper into the mystery of her sister's death, her every move is shadowed by the dark, mysterious Jericho, a man with no past and only mockery for a future. As she begins to close in on the truth, the ruthless Vlane -- an alpha Fae who makes sex an addiction for human women -- closes in on her. And as the boundary between worlds begins to crumble, Mac's true mission becomes clear: find the elusive Sinsar Dubh before someone else claims the all-powerful Dark Book -- because whoever gets to it first holds nothing less than complete control of the very fabric of both worlds in their hands...

I was blown away by this book, my first urban fantasy, I was caught up in the plotline from the beginning and couldn't put it down. I'm starting the next book in the series immediately, I can't wait to read on!

I didn't expect to really like it. I loved Moning's Highlander series, but had not been into the whole fae part of it, so I had no desire to read this series. Fantasy and paranormal are usually not my thing. But, Kindle was giving this book away for free and I downloaded it and gave it a shot - I'm so glad I did!

Mac (MacKayla) Lane is a Barbie doll type of girl, loves the color pink, long blonde hair, loves to pick out outfits and look cute. She's a bartender and lives at home in her parent's house, lounging around their swimming pool working on that golden tan. She's a real girlie girl, used to the good life. She was not unlike the character in Legally Blonde played by Reese Witherspoon. But, Mac's world turns upside down when she gets a phone call that her sister (and best friend) has been murdered in Dublin. No trace of the killer, the case has no leads and is eventually closed. Mac and her parents are devastated and mourn for the loss of their beloved child and sister. Eventually, Mac pulls herself together and flies to Dublin to see if she can get some answers about her sister's death. After belatedly hearing a message on her cell phone from her sister shortly before her murder, Mac can't put it behind her, she must try and get to the bottom of it.

While in Dublin all hell breaks loose for Mac. Suddenly she is swept up in the supernatural world of Seelie's and Unseelie's, who are good and evil fae's that can disguise themselves as humans. She must battle evil vampires, Master Lords and joins up with an enigmatic, handsome bookseller named Jericho Barrons, who becomes her unlikely partner. She's not sure what his motivation is, but he saves her life on more than one occasion and begins to instruct her on the ways that she can kill Unseelies and keep herself alive. He also had an ulterior motive with regard to her - she has a power he needs. Mac learns that she is a Null, a type of shidh-seer (pronounced "she-seer"), who can see monsters (evil faes known as Unseelies, without their glamour facades) that ordinary humans cannot. She becomes a sort of Buffy the Vampire Slayer, only she becomes an Unseelie Slayer. Together she and Barrons try to find these particular OOP's (love this), Hallows that will lead them eventually to a fantastical and legendary book, the Sinsar Dubh that can save the world from the Unseelies.

Still with me?

The story was exciting and I was riveted to it. I kid you not, I couldn't put it down and read it in one day. It was so good! I can't help but wonder who and what Barrons really is. There is some sexual tension between the two, but nothing of note ... yet. I am hopeful, yet I still cannot be sure since I don't know what he is exactly. The various monsters that Mac must come across are horrifying and well described - I felt I was there with her meeting them face to face. Plus, I really love Mac's character. She seems real to me, I can identify with her. A lot of what she thinks and does I can see myself thinking and doing too! She's just an ordinary girl who likes pretty, shiny things and living comfortably. Suddenly she's thrust into this crazy world in which she is constantly looking over her shoulder battling evil and trying to find out what happened to her sister. Most of all, she's trying to find out who she really is. Is she really the daughter of her parents? Was she adopted? Is she descended from a long line of shidh-seers named O'Connor that makes her a human geiger counter for the Hallows? If so, she can prevent the Unseelies from destroying mankind by getting the Sinsar Dubh! Barrons wants the Sinsar Dubh badly - but do we know for sure he's a good guy?

Mac is so endearing. One of the funniest part of the book (and yes, there are some funny moments) is when Mac comes across this devilishly handsome royal Seelie, V'lane. He has this power to make human women want to have sex with him - immediately. They can't help it, and Mac is no exception. As soon as he comes in proximity to her she starts taking off her clothes and doesn't even realize it! She is amazed at herself as well! I laughed out loud at how she finds her bra and panties tossed on the floor - having no idea she has tossed them there. Made for some crazy moments! Luckily, she comes to her senses before V'lane can take advantage of her.

After much excitement, the book ends up in the air with a bit of a cliffhanger, definitely setting the reader up for the rest of the series. There is a glossary of all the different monsters and fae's and who is who. This is very helpful. I'm eager to read the rest of the series. Full of action and suspense - I loved it! I can't wait to continue it, stay tuned for more reviews from me!

4.5/5

Addendum 10/22/2010: 
I've recently re-read Darkfever but on audio this time.  I had my likes and dislikes.  I liked Mac's voice for the most part, but the narrator, Joyce Bean, sounded kind of old for a 22 year old girl, but I liked the Southern accent.  What I did NOT like was the way she made Barrons voice sound.  Not at all how I envisioned him sounding when I read the book last year.  He doesn't sound the least bit carnal or sexy, it's too foreign sounding - I don't know, it's just not how I pictured him sounding (if that makes any sense).  I'm glad to know that by book 4, it's Phil Gigante (gunh!) doing Barrons - crucial!

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