Darkfever by Karen Marie Morning

Darkfever

By Karen Marie Morning

Rating: a strong PG-13

Spoiler Alert: a little, but no details

Coffee Bean Rating: 4.5/5 (I really want to give it a 5!)

Finished a fun, fast, and exciting book. Darkfever by Karen Marie Morning. A friend of mine gave it to me (along with the 2nd and 3rd in the series) a LONG time ago, but I never got around to reading it until now.

I picked it up and finished it in a few days (which is impressive for me right now since it’s 350 pages and I really had to look under couch cushions and behind doors to find time to read it). I read the last page today, halfway through my lunch and was very upset to find that the remaining 10 or so pages were just flyleafs (or is it like the leaves on a tree and is ‘flyleaves’?) and other “non-Mac related” writings! I plan on zipping home and promptly grabbing the next one off my shelf and starting that one. I have a strong feeling that I’ll be starting the third one by Monday. Some books just do that to me (City of Bones series, Sookie Stackhouse, Hunger Games, and Fever series just to name a few).

Enough babbling! Onto the review!

MacKayla (Mac for short) Lane just found out that her sister, while studying abroad in Ireland, has been murdered in a cruel and horrible way. Against her parents’ pleas, Mac quits college (she’s 22) and goes to Ireland and demand that the police reopen her sister’s case and solve the murder. And if they don’t, then by golly, she’s gonna do it for them (and without breaking one of her perfectly pink nails).

She ends up getting a disturbing and cryptic message from her sister via voicemail just hours before she was killed. Trying to seek answers to the clues she was given, she asks the wrong man for help about a book, Jericho Barrons. Turns out, he’s looking for it too, and thinks she's a liability.

Well, that just causes Mac to dig in her heels and try harder (like she says, ‘pride is her special little problem’). Things happen and cause Mac and Barrons to partner up, although reluctantly. There’s so much tension and unacknowledged attraction between them that neither of them sees, or at least will admit to. But I saw it!! And I was soooo hoping that something would happen between them. I knew they were destined for each other the moment they met (but I’m not going to tell you what happens. But I will say this, I am both pleased and very, very not-pleased with how Morning grants my wish).

While trying to track down her sister’s killer and find the book that will help her do it, Mac is plunged into a world she had no idea existed complete with fae, and vampires and all manner of creepers in the shadows. All with a man she knows nothing about or what his true intentions are. With her or with the book.

Morning tells the story from Mac’s pov and does it with sass and humor that made me instantly connect and fall in love with our heroine. Morning is witty and funny, created multiple forms and types of tension with masterful skill that had me turning the page under my desk at work (just kidding, of course. Or am I? Mwahaha).

A warning in advance: I looked on the spine of the book to find out what genre it was and read, Romance. Hmmm…while there are scenes not intended for the faint at heart (which may or may not include me) this was by no means a typical “romance/bodice ripper” type book. But, I’ll admit here and now, I was rooting the entire way through the book for Barrons and Mac to kiss. :)

--Me