Shadowfever Winner!

Thanks so much to everyone who entered my Shadowfever giveaway, Random.org picked a number and the winner is:

CATHY

Congratulations Cathy, I hope you love this book as much as I did! Don't forget that each stop on this blog tour offers a new opportunity to win a copy of Shadowfever, so be sure and check out the other participating blogs so you can read their reviews and enter their giveaways as well!

Review+Giveaway: Shadowfever

SHADOWFEVER (Fever Series #5)
Karen Marie Moning
Urban Fantasy
594 Pages
Delacorte Press
Available Now
Received via TLC Book Tours for review

This review contains NO spoilers.

THE STORY
MacKayla Lane used to have a pretty simple life. She was pretty. Boys always liked her. She had a home, loving parents, and a best friend in her sister Alina. Then, with no warning, Alina was brutally taken from her, leaving behind only a cryptic message that changed Mac's life forever.

Now, having been in Dublin, Ireland for months trying to determine who killed her sister and forced into an uneasy alliance with the mysterious Jericho Barrons, Mac is no longer that pretty southern girl. She knows darkness and she knows pain. And as she finds herself more deeply immersed in the world of the fae and the hunt for the Sinsar Dubh, her life is more complicated and dangerous than ever.

She thought she knew what side she was on. She thought she'd already experienced the worst pain and loss a person can endure. She thought her sister was the one who mattered most. She was wrong. On all counts. Questions abound, blackness hovers ominously at every turn, and the young woman with a love for all things pink finds herself a key player in the most epic of battles in the conclusion to this stunning series.

MY THOUGHTS
The Fever Series is extraordinarily aptly named, inciting a burn in us from the very first page that increases in intensity with each subsequent book until it culminates in a finale that sends our hearts up in flames as we lose ourselves in the all-consuming visceral awareness of Mac and Barrons, and the palpable, complicated friction between them. Our body temperature ratchets up with every wordless communication they exchange and every careful avoidance of physical contact until sweat beads on our skin in a conditioned physiological response to seeing their two names side by side in inky blackness, just as the pages practically smoke as a result of the speed with which we're flipping them in our haste to know every last detail of this spectacular fantasy. This story is passion and fire, pain and loss, and vengeance and forgiveness, reaching out with invisible fingers to wrap our hearts in an unyielding grip as it promises not necessarily a tale of joy and hope, but rather one of addicting darkness. Part of the appeal is an end that has the potential to deny us the happiness we seek, keeping our feelings in constant flux as we consider the possibility we may arrive at the last page with the hope of finding our emotional wounds stitched together and healing, only to discover a mere tourniquet awaits to help slow the bleeding.

Mac is a character who begins her journey as a young girl of sunshine and warmth, content with being pretty and blond as she revels in pastel colors and other superficial trivialities. What she becomes is a woman of substance, fundamentally altered by the trials we experience vicariously by her side, watching in shock, awe, and incomprehensible pain as she is emotionally eviscerated, physically beaten, and almost completely stripped of all her comforting and recognizable attributes. Though her story is dark and she at times makes decisions with a flawed logic that results in yet another mental or physical scar, she always manages to maintain a death grip on that rainbow girl we met four books prior, and we hold tight to that remnant as the black and crimson of Dublin's battle with the fey comes in various forms to render us both monochromatic.

A man and character who utterly defies definition, Jericho Barrons has us melting at his feet despite the fierce independence of which we think ourselves so capable the moment he opens his mouth and overwhelms us with intensity of his presence. He is a man who embodies qualities that should unnerve us, emanating an unforgettable and predatory sexual ferocity as well as a confidence and intelligence that is neither assumed nor learned, but is part of his very makeup. Though we may struggle and attempt an ultimately futile resistance, we find ourselves drawn into the inexplicable force field he projects–consumed, owned, and shockingly addicted to a complete enigma. This is a man we know virtually nothing about despite having read four novels of which he is a main character, and every tidbit of information we are given in this final installment only serves to further increase our hunger for knowledge–thrusting us into a perpetual cycle of information gathering and seeking from which we have no desire to escape if it means we get to linger a few more moments in his company. In this last book we learn more about him that we ever have before, and we drink in the new facets of a man that has haunted us greedily, quenching a thirst years in the making.

A simple review can never adequately describe Shadowfever, words on a page being spectacularly poor substitutes for the strength of feeling and broad emotional spectrum captured between its covers. Ms. Moning is more than a storyteller, her characters far more tangible than fictional beings could ever be thought to be, and she has created a world of infinite complexity that openly challenges us, dares us to experience it and remain only a passive observer, and then yanks us in with a shocking brute strength as it subjects us to the sharpest of pains sparsely interspersed with the warmest of joys. Enter into this final piece of the puzzle with a first-aid kit at the ready, as Ms. Moning is a master at inflicting wounds designed to injure but not kill, and she subjects both her characters and us to numerous events that leave indelible marks on the soft flesh of our hearts. Despite the pain, we revel in the emotional injuries, honored to be privy to a book capable of having such a remarkable effect.

Rating: 5/5

GIVEAWAY

Thanks to the fabulous people at Random House and TLC Book Tours, I have a copy of Shadowfever to give away to one very lucky commenter. This giveaway is open to US and Canadian residents only and will run through midnight EST on February 14th after which time a winner will be chosen and announced on the blog.

Each stop on this blog tour offers a new opportunity to win a copy of Shadowfever, so be sure and check out the other participating blogs so you can read their reviews and enter their giveaways as well! Good luck everyone!

In My Mailbox #18

In My Mailbox was created by Kristi over at The Story Siren and is a great way to see what other bloggers are reading and reviewing. I always love seeing what everyone else got for their week!



FOR REVIEW:
Shadowfever by Karen Marie Moning (from Goodreads):

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 that haunts her dreams? More importantly, who is Mac and what is the destiny she glimpses in the black and crimson designs of an ancient tarot card?

From the luxury of the Lord Master's penthouse, to the sordid depths of an Unseelie nightclub, from the erotic bed of her lover, to the terrifying bed of the Unseelie King, Mac's journey will force her to face the truth of her exile, and make a choice that will either save the world...or destroy it.

In the Arms of Stone Angels by Jordan Dane

Two years ago, Brenna did the unthinkable. She witnessed the aftermath of a murder and accused her only true friend—the first boy she ever loved—of being a killer.

Now sixteen, Brenna returns to Oklahoma only to discover that Isaac “White Bird” Henry isn’t in juvie. The half-breed outcast is in a mental hospital, frozen in time, locked in his mind at the worst moment of his life. And when Brenna touches him, she’s pulled into his hellish vision quest, seeing terrifying demons and illusions she doesn’t understand.

Feeling isolated and alone, she’s up against the whole town, targeted by bullying former classmates, a bigoted small town sheriff, and a tribe who refuses to help one of their own. But when Brenna realizes she’s as trapped by the past as White Bird is, this time she won’t turn her back on him. She’s the only one who can free them both.

Even if she has to expose her secret—a “gift” she’s kept hidden her whole life.

BOUGHT:
Simply Irresistible by Jill Shalvis (from Goodreads):

Maddie Moore's whole life needs a makeover.

In one fell swoop, Maddie loses her boyfriend (her decision) and her job (so not her decision). But rather than drowning her sorrows in bags of potato chips, Maddie leaves L.A. to claim the inheritance left by her free-spirited mother-a ramshackle inn nestled in the little coastal town of Lucky Harbor, Washington.

Starting over won't be easy. Yet Maddie sees the potential for a new home and a new career-if only she can convince her two half-sisters to join her in the adventure. But convincing Tara and Chloe will be difficult because the inn needs a big makeover too.

The contractor Maddie hires is a tall, dark-haired hottie whose eyes-and mouth-are making it hard for her to remember that she's sworn off men. Even harder will be Maddie's struggles to overcome the past, though she's about to discover that there's no better place to call home than Lucky Harbor.

Waiting on Wednesday

Waiting on Wednesday is a weekly event hosted by Breaking The Spine and is a fun way to see what books other bloggers just can't wait to get their hands on!




Shadowfever (Fever Series #5)
Karen Marie Moning
Urban Fantasy
January 18th, 2011

From Goodreads:
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 that 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 that contains 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 that haunts her dreams? More importantly, who is Mac and what is the destiny she glimpses in the black and crimson designs of an ancient tarot card? From the luxury of the Lord Master's penthouse, to the sordid depths of an Unseelie nightclub, from the erotic bed of her lover, to the terrifying bed of the Unseelie King, Mac's journey will force her to face the truth of her exile, and make a choice that will either save the world...or destroy it.

This is one of the most deliciously frustrating series I've ever read. Book 4 ended with a spectacular cliffhanger, and Ms. Moning's monthly newsletters with teasers from this final book are going to give me a stress-induced ulcer if I don't find out all about Mac and Barrons soon! If you haven't read this series yet and you are a fan of Urban Fantasy, add it to your list immediately!