Shadowfever | Thoughts
5 Stars
STORY
Characters | 5 stars
All right, I'll admit it. Jericho Barrons grew on me. Mac, not so much, but I grudgingly accept her now. Barrons stayed Barrons the entire story. Never changed who he was to meet anyone's expectations. Quickest way to this girl's heart is have a character stay true to their nature, not flip the second they have love thrown their way. I did not find the romance all that swoon worthy - plenty of sexual tension, but I could probably count the swoon worthy lines on one hand, out of the whole 5 books (I'll try and compile them sometime - should have thought of it while I found them). I got whiplash from how back and forth these two were, which is more of a complaint of the writing style than the characters, I suppose.
Aside from Barrons and Mac, so many more of our characters felt fleshed out in this installment. Maybe it's because we've been delivered them in slow bits and pieces over the course of five books, and this last one is finally where things start to come together, but I was attached to almost everyone in Shadowfever. Ryodan, Dani, V'lane, Jack Lane, DEG...even Darroc. There were plenty of new faces that finally showed up, new revelations that made earlier details finally click into place. The revelation about who and what Mac is, who and what Barrons is, left me fully satisfied. And they're not the only two that had true faces come to light.
Setting | 5 stars
We're still in New Dublin, after the walls have come down, but it's the other worlds we get to see as Mac blunders about having no clue what she's doing that were imaginative and satisfying. I can think back to at least five different dimensions, all with their own logic and landscapes and emotional feel. Dublin may only have been a shell, but the changes laid over the streets and countryside from the world of Faery blending through is almost what I was looking for from the beginning. Ireland is magical in itself if you look right, no Fae walls collapsing needed.
Plot | 5 stars
Without giving anything away, I'll say again I got whiplash from how back and forth the track of this story line went. One minute you have all the evidence and Mac is convinced things are a certain way and two pages later her entire being is focused in the other direction because NEW EVIDENCE! I liked the direction her character was going at the start, then we fell back into old Mac patterns throughout the middle. JUST STICK TO WHAT YOU SAID YOU WERE GOING TO DO for fuck's sake. We received a lot of conclusions and a storyline we only got snippets of as a backstory previously comes to full light - probably my favorite part. UK & SQ 4Eva. Also, K'vruk.
TECHNICAL
Writing | 3 stars
I definitely think the writing has improved, but is just not my style. The layers of sentences where Mac is questioning everything, the exclamation points, the way we are in the middle of a crucial scene and then it's just *fade to black* and picks up later when it's over. That applies to action scenes, romantic scenes, scenes of tension. Stay in the moment, damnit. Although this aspect is how the story moves so quickly, enabling these books to be a seriously addictive binge-read. I do not know what I would have done had I started this series when it first came out and had to wait the entire year between each release. The cliffhangers are brutal.
I appreciate the adult romance, but some of the banter and interaction seemed too crudely forced. Sex is part of the whole story line, what with these "death-by-sex" Fae's (one of my biggest hurdles to get over with this story, by the way...I rolled my eyes every time it was stated. We get it, they're sexy and you basically go insane from them.) But sometimes the crudeness took me right out of the moment in thinking "ew who says that." Way to kill a vibe.
Editing | 5 stars
Found some errors, nothing major, though I really think the editors should have suggested some more development of crucial scenes. While it's one of this story's assets that the plot moves quickly, sometimes it was too quick. My main point in this installment is Mac's time with Darroc. SPOILER ALERT: Finally face to face again now that Mac is badass (or we think she is...she thinks she is...I don't know, like I said - whiplash), enemies to "friends", escaping worlds, teamed up, she's infiltrating his bases, showdown with the Fae, Unseelie Princes, WHOA he's dead and it's over in five pages. Like...what? After five books of him being the Big Bad, he teams up with Mac because she says so and then gets killed so easily? Okay.
Execution | 4 stars
This usually goes along with Editing in my mind, as editors help the execution go smoothly. My above issues with development and pacing really fall on the writer and style, though, so 4 stars here for lack of those in critical areas.
Emotional Rating | 5 stars
Yep, was hooked to this series like crack and have a new broody monster to go in the bag of bad guys to gush over. Rhysand and Hunt, meet Jericho. He stays his bad-guy ground a little stronger than you two, but you'll all enjoy one another, I think.
Undecided if I'll continue reading with the spin off series, as I hear they are a bit of rinse and repeat...but there's a reason we have a rinse option at all. We like to repeat at times.