Genre: Paranormal
Book 1 in the Chronicles of MacKayla
ISBN: 0-385-33915-1
Releasedate: October 31, 2006
Publisher: Delacorte Press
Format owned: HC-Delacorte
For sale at: The Book Depository Store

Synopsis
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...

REVIEW
If you’re expecting a dark brooding highlander like in Karen Marie Monings Highlander series you’re in for a surprise. With this 1st novel in the Fever series Karen shows that she not only has a talent in writing a time-travel Highlander novel but she can also write a contemporary-suspense!!!

Eventhough this series is linked with the Highlander series it’s deliciously different, first of its set in Dublin-Ireland instead of Scotland and second off it’s written in the I-form. It did get me a chapter or two to get used to the I-form but once settled inside MacKayla’s head I loved being there. I found a marvellous place to settle in, and could so relate to the following scene:

Quote:
He barked “Air ye deaf, lass?”
I think he might have called me a hairy jackass…

It made me laugh out loud because I could really relate to that, having been there myself.

This story is Mac’s past, what happened there? I yearn to find out more, so I will soon dive into Bloodfever as it’s eyeing my from my shelf already tempting me in saying “Come hither, put your pen down, pick me up and READ ME!!!” Yeah alright in a minute *wink*…

While reading you truly get to know MacKayla, her feelings when she finds out all the things she is not. What I found brilliantly done was that in the first pages of this book you get to see what MacKayla used to be like. When she finds out all the things in her past that just isn’t what it seems and how it affects her you can still see bits of her back, eventhough changes in herself had to be made!

W I finished reading I think in the end I missed a concluded story a wee bit. There’s no real end yet so I’m glad I’m able to read on straight away. So many things are still up in the air making you think constantly about what will happen next. If I had to wait a year to dive into Bloodfever – I do not even want to comprehend! Because there was no real end to this novel yet, it didn’t mean it didn’t stop at the right moment. The setting in this series has been made, the introduction is complete and the follow up is coming so indeed overall it was great. The way this series is written, it either works or it doesn’t and I have to say in the way Karen Marie Moning has written it so far it works for me!

actually not written as fast-paste as what I’m used to from Karen Marie Moning; making the reading experience a whole different one. Because the story-telling has such a different angle you feel the feelings while reading it, in a whole different way as well.

A few characters have come to pass who stuck in my mind, and whom I die to get to know better, I mean there is Fiona, Jericho, V’Lane, the lady in the bar who keeps popping up! And not to forget

All-in-all it is a pure Karen Marie Moning novel. She has her own unique way of writing her stories. Humor is always a part of it, which is a must for me! I’m highly intrigued and looking forward to the follow ups in this series – if only to see more of V’Lane and Jericho. First of Jericho came across as a bit of a stuffy librarian type but the scene where he jumped from the roof (when you read it you’ll know what I mean) right then and there he stole my heart! And V’Lane – Alpha Fae to the core, so ofcourse I’m into him, if looks could only charm the pants off…. Owh wait – his look does *sigh and wickedly grinning*.

Quote:
Jericho said: “After the two of you have finished here, show ms Lane to a room. Tomorrow purchase shears and buy an assortment of hair colors for her to choose from.”
“A room?” Fiona exclaimed.
“Shears? Hair colors?” I exclaimed. My hands flew to my hair. I’d address the room part in a minute. I HAD my priorities.

4 Stars