Magic Shifts (Kate Daniels Book 8)

Another absolutely fantastic story from these two amazing authors!The book title says it all, the magic has definitely shifted!Kate and Curran have now split from the pack and are currently waiting out the final official notice period. It's a testing time for them both adjusting to a much closer life together and waiting to see who from the pack will join them. As always trouble is never far away in the form of a vengeful ifrit. A member of the pack, Eduardo, has been taken hostage for the crimes of his family's previous relatives. His girlfriend George, daughter of Mahon, alpha of Clan Heavy asks for their help as her father disapproves of the union so is refusing to help. Lots of fast paced action follows, a near death experience and major family drama.The thing I loved most about this book is kate and Curran are together nearly all the time. I've missed that in the previous few stories so I'm really pleased to be getting so much more interaction between them and their close family members. Their relationship seems to be getting stronger and stronger with every book and this solidified it for me. This story is a fantastic bridge between their old life as beast Lord and consort and their new and hopefully more content time in their lives. ( although who am I kidding, the chance of them catching a break is slim to none!)The father/daughter relationship starting to form between Kate and Roland is going to make for some interesting times too!A brilliant read!

Presuming you have read all the previous Kate Daniels books, by comparison this is a solid effort but nothing about the plot lasts. It is an excellent way to pass free time but it wont have you riveted to turn the pages and sleepless to find out how it ends.I live urban fantasy and i love Kate Daniels and i have to say this book is an example of how to get the genre just right. The writing is spot on and it feels like Andrews is (are) such a pro that by this point in the series the characters just write themsleves. This is a world so richly detailed, so thoroughly imagined, and so populated with such enjoyable and impressive characters that the story just flies by, one feat of wowness after anither, at a breathtaking and believeble pace.What was so good about this book was the humour and the sparks between Kate and Cullen. I strugglr to think of another urban fantasy which has depicted an ongoing love story so realistically. Theirs is a believeable relationship with ups and downs and but an unshakeabke bond at its core.The dialogue between them and other characters was expertly done. In other books i can sometimes be guilty of skipping dialogue but in this book you skip it at your peril. So much of the drama and poignancy and humour is relayed through the dialogue, it's almost script like. As a result, there is not much in the prose to reveal or explain Kate's feelings and reactions and at timea this left her feeling a bit distant, in my opinion.Overall i think the world is beginning to suffer from being too awesome for its own good. By that i mean that all the characters are now so badass that as a reader i never felt they were ever at any real peril apart from a very human physical problem Kate has in the middle of a book (not to spoil it, but this plot point was the only real emotional hit of the book). Its obvious thr good guys will win in the end and consequently i didnt have that 'must keep reading to find out what happens/who survives' feeling. At this point, the only real adversary Kate has left is Roland. Which i suppose is the point.I was pleasently surprised with how the transition from the pack to lifr on their own was handled as that could have easily been the end. On the other hand, after bringing up Curran's conflicts about no longer being Beast Lord in the first half, this was forgotten in the second half and i feel this is a bigger issue that would create much more conflict between Kate and Curran. But perhaps this will feature in later books.At the end of the day, if you are following the series this is a must read but dont expect to be blown away like tge previous installment. However its obvious the series is leading somewhere spectacular and this book was so witty and filled with fresh monsters and lore that it was far from a drag or filler book. Im just glad i waited until the price was reduced

This has the feel of a transitional scene setter for how the series is likely to develop. In the last (excellent) book Magic Breaks, kick-ass heroine Kate Daniels and Beast Lord Curran ended up breaking with the Pack, the urban tribe of were-critters that never accepted Kate as Curran's mate. That unfortunately cuts them adrift from a productive storyline threading its way through all the novels up to now. How to replace it? In Magic Shifts it looks very like Curran and Kate are about to take over the failing Mercenary Guild which will allow a whole new take on empire building in the magic-plagued alternate Atlanta that forms the backdrop to the series. Magic sweeps over the city in unpredictable waves, rendering 21st century tech inoperative while it lasts and unleashing all manner of weird beasties. As ever, these are well realised by the husband and wife team behind the Ilona Andrews name, especially Mitchell, the pathetic tame ghoul kept by the government Biohazard Division. He was formerly human - could he hold the key to the latest threat to the city? Something is coming and it seems to be behind the disappearance of Kate's friend Eduardo, who has joined the Mercenary Guild. The action centres on Kate and Curran's search for Eduardo and what's behind his disappearance while trying to work out what Kate's lethal father Roland might be plotting - up to and including killing her as a threat to his power. Throw in Middle Eastern mythology, pitched battles with fire giants and were-critter politics for a heady mix. It didn't quite gel as well for me as some of the earlier series but still manages to be a cut above the norm in the crowded urban fantasy genre. It will be interesting to see where the authors go next, especially if there's a power clash between the Pack and a Mercenary Guild revitalised under Curran and Kate.