Name: Burned
ISBN: 9781455817757

Karen Marie Moning

Phil Gigante

Natalie Ross

Burned

"MacKayla Lane and Jericho Barrons are back and hotter than ever in Burned, the latest novel in the blockbuster Fever series from #1 New York Times bestselling author Karen Marie Moning. It's easy to walk away from lies. Power is another thing. MacKayla Lane would do anything to save the home she loves. A gifted sidhe-seer, she's already fought and defeated the deadly Sinsar Dubh--an ancient book of terrible evil--yet its hold on her has never been stronger. When the wall that protected humans from the seductive, insatiable Fae was destroyed on Halloween, long-imprisoned immortals ravaged the planet. Now Dublin is a war zone with factions battling for control. As the city heats up and the ice left by the Hoar Frost King melts, tempers flare, passions run red-hot, and dangerous lines get crossed. Seelie and Unseelie vie for power against nine ancient immortals who have governed Dublin for millennia; a rival band of sidhe-seers invades the city, determined to claim it for their own; Mac's former protege and best friend, Dani "Mega" O'Malley, is now her fierce enemy; and even more urgent, Highland druid Christian MacKeltar has been captured by the Crimson Hag and is being driven deeper into Unseelie madness with each passing day. The only one Mac can depend on is the powerful, dangerous immortal Jericho Barrons, but even their fiery bond is tested by betrayal. It's a world where staying alive is a constant struggle, the line between good and evil is blurred, and every alliance comes at a price. In an epic battle against dark forces, Mac must decide who she can trust, and what her survival is ultimately worth"--

"Burned picks up right where the surprising conclusion of Iced left off, and will feature beloved characters Mac and Dani O'Malley as they embark on another high-octane adventure in the Fever world"--

a fever novel

Annalissa Powner 

Weeeelll that explains sooooo much of the tension!

Anna Ureta

Before I start, let me just clarify my rating system, just in case people think my rating is unfair.
I rate books by how much I enjoy them, how much they move me, and how entertained I am. 6+ means this book was beyond anything I could have felt. 5 Hearts means that it was extremely entertaining, touching, moving, whatever. 4 Hearts is around my average, saying I felt something, and was entertained but it could have been better or just didn’t cut it for me. 3 and below…well maybe the book just wasn’t for me.

Burned is the seventh and HIGHLY ANTICIPATED continuation in the Fever Series by Karen Marie Moning. I can’t tell you how long I’ve waited for this book, how much I cried over it, how much I agonized over it being constantly pushed back. This was the series that got me into reading; this is the series that changed my life. I can’t say enough good things about the Fever series and about this amazing installment, but unfortunately out of all the books KMM has written, Burned has turned out to be my least favourite.

After the events in Iced, Christian has been captured by the Crimson Hag, Cruce is still in ice under the Abbey, the Hoar Frost King has been defeated, and Mac is back, possibly seeking revenge on the person who killed her sister. Now that the ice left by Hoar Frost King is starting to melt people are starting to become testy. Alliances form, new enemies gather, and Dani who was once Mac’s best friend is now a sworn enemy. Tensions run high between the Seelie, Unseelie and sidhe-seers when they all agree that saving Christian MacKeltar has become a priority. But can they trust each other long enough to save him? And can Mac trust anyone other than herself?

I have A LOT to say about this installment so I’ll try to make it brief.
Did I like this book? Yes.
Did I enjoy this book? It had its merits. Did I feel it lived up to the Fever Series title? Yes and No.
There has been a lot of controversy and mixed reviews about this highly anticipated novel that got pushed back 2 YEARS almost, for various reasons.
One thing I will say is that because of all the person events that happened in KMM’s life, and the time between Iced and Burned and maybe even between Shadowfever and Iced, I feel like KMM sort of…lost her way. These two books feel….somewhat disconnected from the series, and I get that Dani was originally supposed to get 2-3 books to herself but now it just…feels like reading these books was a waste, like in Burned, KMM tried to please more people or erase the events of what happened in Iced. I’M NOT SAYING I would unread them or wish I hadn’t read them, but these books don’t feel like a fully formed idea and that KMM was really just grasping at straws, trying to continue a series that maybe….should have ended at book five.

Don’t get me wrong. I LOVED Iced, I had no idea what anyone’s problem was with it. I had confidence that in Dani’s second book things would start to fall into place. But it didn’t happen like that. Plans and plots sort of changed…and well, I didn’t really like the direction this book turned to (at least that’s my opinion). As much as missed Mac and her bad-ass self, this book just didn’t do it for me. I found Mac EXTREMELY ANNOYING in most of Part 1 of the book where I felt like NOTHING HAPPENED. The entirety of it consisted of a lot of unnecessary ‘self-acknowledgement’ for things she had done that she regretted. “Okay, we get it, can we please move on.” I felt like the only redeeming qualities were any conversations she had with Barrons or with Ryodan where witty banter was present. “Stop feeling sorry for yourself, Mac. Right now is not the time to be beating yourself up about things.”

 I sometimes wonder if our passion is so obsessive and enormous that we need distance between the bonfires. I’m a moth to his flame and it frightens me how willingly I’d turn my wings off for him. Destroy the world. Follow him to Hell. It’s scary to feel like you can’t breathe without someone. That a man has so much power over you because you love him as much as, if not than, you care for yourself.

Some of Part 2 and Part 3-4 were what brought me back to the original Fever series (book 1-5). I was anxious to read the next chapter, I was on the edge of my seat, my stomach was in knots, I was laughing at every witty thing everyone said, like it was good times again. It was fast-paced, it was interesting and it just felt right again. I will admit to enjoying the new POVs and discovering A WHOLE LOT about the Nine and Ryodan, who I have an even bigger respect for now (As if I didn’t respect him enough before).

There was a lot of good in this book and a whole lot of bad to counter it.
To be completely honest I didn’t have a lot of hope for this book to begin with. After it being pushed back for so long I said, “This book has to be the best thing I’ve ever read for me to accept it.” Because my problem was was that KMM gave a definitive date every time she pushed the book back, instead of just saying “Released in 2014″ or 2015. My problem was a release date was like a promise to her fans that she broke multiple times. Again, I get a lot of personal things happened to her but every time she set the date back and broke that promise I couldn’t help but feel crushed.

I don’t expect much of Feverborn, and won’t be surprised if she pushes the date back again.
Still, I look forward to seeing Mac, Barrons, Ryodan and the rest of the gang…trying to save the world, trying to make it right again. After all, I can’t resist my two favourite alpha males. ;)

3.5-4/5 Hearts of Love

Amelia

Ok I was so excited to have Mac back but I am BUMMED that her relationship with Barrons is pretty toxic. Also Dani as Jada WOWOW!

Sarah Escorsa

I wish I was angry right now. As angry as I was when I finished reading Iced. But I'm just sad. Terribly sad and disappointed.

Technically, Burned isn't badly written. It's just completely flat and unemotional and everything books 1 to 5 weren't. There is no excitement there, no tension (sexual or otherwise). Burned didn't make my heart race, it didn't make me turn every page in frantic anticipation, it didn't turn me into an emotional wreck. And it certainly didn't make me want to throw my underwear across the room (despite the constant references to sex). This book didn't keep me up all night because I couldn't bear to put it down. It kept me up all night because I just wanted to get it over with. 

I understand what KMM tried to do here. I really do. After all the backlash she faced over Iced, she tried to redeem herself. And that's great, it means she listens to her readers and I respect her for that. The problem is that you can tell this version of Burned isn't the one she originally intended to write. Instead of trying to work with what she had (the events in Iced), she tried to make it all disappear. In Burned KMM is on a mission to right all the wrongs in Iced. And Fever loses its soul in the process. Because you can't just pull a few magic tricks to change the direction of the series and erase what happened in the last book. Iced happened. KMM should have accepted it and done something with it, as infuriating as it might have been. Burned just reads like a major cop-out. And you can tell KMM's heart isn't in it.

What did we lose here? So many things. I don't know where to start.

Mac & Barrons are only pale copies of what they once were. There was intimacy between them at the end of Shadowfever. They had a relationship/partnership or whatever you want to call it. It meant something. Especially after all they went through. He called her Mac, she called him Jericho. Now? It's back to Ms Lane and Barrons. Oh no, wait. It's Mac & Jericho when they screw each other senseless (which they don't here but more on that later). All intimacy is gone. All spark is gone. Now it's just two brick walls talking to each other. The Constant Jackass isn't even around most of the time. Bloody hell, I miss you JZB. What it took five books to achieve, KMM undid in Burned. And it's heartbreaking.

Mac is a ghost of her former self. In the first half of the book she is passive and completely apathetic. All she does is drag herself around, rambling to herself incessantly. Her inner dialogue never stops and more than half of it is both boring and uninteresting. I never liked Rainbow Mac much but I'd give anything to have her back. At least she didn't feel sorry for herself and didn't let others boss her around. What really shocked me here is the way she's being treated by the other characters. They all seem to think she's a brainless twit. A pathetic idiot. (view spoiler)[
  
     “Her brain vanished when her body did,” Ryodan says to Barrons. “Apparently,” Barrons says.
  
 (hide spoiler)] Or was this supposed to be funny and I didn't get it? I thought it was insulting. So was Dancer's attitude when he tried to explain (view spoiler)[the black hole at Chester's (hide spoiler)]. Mac is no Einstein but she definitely is no nitwit either. It feels like the other characters in the book have no respect whatsoever for her. I hated it. She grows more spine in the second half of the book but she still doesn't feel like Mac 5.0.

Now for the total cop-out. KMM has a magic hat. It's full of magic tricks that magically transforms characters into entirely new personas. Add a wave of magic wand and tada! Iced forgotten. All problems solved. It's a wonderful world. Major spoilers ahead, do not click on the tags if you haven't read the book.

(view spoiler)[Dani: the moment she disappeared in the Silvers I knew this was KMM's cheap trick to make her age. Make her go away in Faery for a few weeks/months and have her come back at a more appropriate age, so that readers will no longer think of Ryo and Christian as pedos. Then Jada made an appearance and I was pretty sure she was Dani. Then dismissed the idea. Surely, KMM wouldn't pull this on us. Unfortunately she did. "Hey look, it's Dani! She's an immature 14-year-old brat." Five minutes later: "hey look, it's Jada/Dani! She's a 20-year-old ass-kicking sex bomb!" Sorry but no. This just doesn't work for me. I wish we'd seen Dani age and evolve because no matter how aggravating I've always thought her to be I still think she's a very interesting character who deserves much more than this overnight transformation. It really is a shame KMM didn't write this book from Dani's POV and give her character a chance to develop.

Ryo: this is even worse than Dani. At least Dani's transformation makes sense somehow. But this? What a way to ruin a character. I've always loved Ryo. He used to be a complete bastard. Unapologetically so. Now? He's a freaking saint. An avenging angel who's been watching over Dani and protecting her for years, with the help of the Nine. Why did he have Dani locked up in the dungeon at Chester's (in Iced)? Not to punish her for killing Unseelie. Not because he's a total asshole. No. Because he wanted to find out what Dani remembered about what Rowena did to her. He broke her finger in Iced? So sorry about that, he tends to forget that humans are such fragile beings. Seriously? He is thousands of years old but he forgets how frail humans are? And he calls her "my Dani!" Can I just cry for a minute here? The icing on the cake? Mac now admires and respects him. Sees him as her older brother. Did I miss something? When did this happen? This is BS. A total travesty. I loved Ryo the asshole. I hate Ryo the saint.

Christian: we don't see him much here but the few chapters told from his POV left me dumbfounded. Not a single word about his lusting over Dani. Not one. It's like he never entertained the idea of getting into her pants. Poof! Pedo thoughts forgotten! Pretty handy. (hide spoiler)]

There are a few more things I'd like to add before I put an end to this review. In any other book they would have been major annoyances. But in this wreckage they turn out to be minor quibbles:

The book is pretty boring. I just reread the whole series and while doing so realized KMM has a serious editing problem. It mainly lies in the inner dialogues, as I previously mentioned. They are much too long, not interesting enough and add little to the story. I skimmed through a LOT of pages here.

The plot isn't fascinating. It's not bad, it's just not nearly as complex as it was in the first five books.

Sex. Sex is everywhere. There are sexual references in every single page (and probably even single paragraph) of the book. And the problem isn't that it's sex-sex-sex all the time. The problem is that it adds nothing to the story and serves no purpose at all (I'm not talking about Lor's POV here, which I thought was great -more on that later). Okay, so Mac & Barrons aren't getting any and Mac is horny as hell. I got it the first time you said it, no need to re-hash it over and over again. She lusts after Barrons, Ryo, Lor… Her "ode" to Ryo's dick left me bewildered. She has fantasies about being sandwiched between Barrons and Ryo… Yes, I get it. Mac needs to get laid. Very badly. This is absolutely fascinating, now can we move on? Nope, doesn't seem like it.

(view spoiler)[The invisibility trick. Yet another rabbit out of KMM's magic hat. I felt like I was reading Harry Potter again. This was basically a cheap plot device to offer alternate POVs . In retrospect I'm thinking this wasn't such a bad idea after all. This book is overloaded with POVs (Mac, Dani, Lor, the Unseelie King, Christian, Kat…) so throwing Ryo's and Barrons' in the mix would have meant instant combustion. (hide spoiler)]

What makes me even sadder here is that there were great things in this book. It could and should have been fantastic.

(view spoiler)[
  Mac and the Sinsar Dubh.
 (hide spoiler)]  Such a cool idea. It gave me high hopes for the book but kind of fell flat after a while. (view spoiler)[The book tries to control Mac, she recites The Raven to resist it. Repeat. Repeat. Repeat. And the Sinsar Dubh is no longer heard of after Mac becomes invisible… (hide spoiler)]

(view spoiler)[
  The Unseelie Princess
 (hide spoiler)] Yet another great idea that wasn't exploited to its full potential. I would have loved to read more about her and her sisters.

I loved the Unseelie King's POVs. They were mostly sad but beautifully written.

I loved Lor's POVs. The guy just cracks me up and he is one of the very few characters in the book that actually feels like he's alive. The whole (view spoiler)[Pri-ya (hide spoiler)] thing is hilarious. He is completely unapologetic about who he is and that makes him pretty irresistible.

I expected many things when I started reading Burned. I certainly didn't expect to feel so sad and heartbroken upon finishing it. I still can't believe this just happened. I don't want to believe this just happened. I feel like I've lost a friend and am suffering from an emotional hangover. Karen Marie Moning, congratulations on a job well done. You managed to ruin this series and break my heart at the same time. Such an overachiever. Someone should give you a prize.

Elif Gültekin

Christina M Masters

I know this book is one of the more devisive in the series, but I enjoyed it. It didn't blow my mind in any sense of the word, but I enjoyed some of the twists and I always enjoy the humor KMM interjects. I think it helped that it has been quite awhile since I have read the earlier books, so I wasn't really looking for more of the same. I am looking forward to reading the next two books in the series.

Kristen

"I could get lost in pining for the way things used to be... The only thing that keeps us rooted in the past is our refusal to embrace the present."

Fangirl rating: 5 stars. I LOVE Mac. I LOVE Barrons. And I admit, Iced put Ryodan, a character I had mostly overlooked before (skimming past him to get back to Barrons), into a special place in my heart, so I LOVE him now, too. 

Unfortunately, this book was sort of a mess, though. What was the plot? Mostly it was just filler. It's taking us from Iced to the next story arc. It's filling in some blanks with the Book, with the Nine, with Dani (MOSTLY with Dani), with Ryodan, with the world. It's tying up some loose ends, creating drama between Mac and Barrons that, let's face it, we know isn't really going to hurt them, and setting up all the pieces for the next big thing. We got some answered questions. We got some insight. We got some adventure. But really, what was the main plot? I don't know. I can't pinpoint it. This book was fanservice, meant to win back everyone who were upset about Iced. It was still so entertaining and fun, I think Karen Marie Moning could write a story about a paper bag and I'd swoon over it at this point. 

Still my favorite series of all time. 

Also, sue me, I LOVE where Jo ended up in this book. I know a lot of people were not happy with that development, but I think it's AWESOME. Made me smile every time it came up.

Jessica smith

Lanie H

Tifani Dyson

NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER * "Mac is back and badder than ever!"--J. R. Ward MacKayla Lane and Jericho Barrons return in the blockbuster Fever series from Karen Marie Moning. It's easy to walk away from lies. Power is another thing. MacKayla Lane would do anything to save the home she loves. A gifted sidhe-seer, she's already fought and defeated the deadly Sinsar Dubh--an ancient book of terrible evil--yet its hold on her has never been stronger. When the wall that protected humans from the seductive, insatiable Fae was destroyed on Halloween, long-imprisoned immortals ravaged the planet. Now Dublin is a war zone with factions battling for control. As the city heats up and the ice left by the Hoar Frost King melts, tempers flare, passions run red-hot, and dangerous lines get crossed. Seelie and Unseelie vie for power against nine ancient immortals who have governed Dublin for millennia; a rival band of sidhe-seers invades the city, determined to claim it for their own; Mac's former protégé and best friend, Dani "Mega" O'Malley, is now her fierce enemy; and even more urgent, Highland druid Christian MacKeltar has been captured by the Crimson Hag and is being driven deeper into Unseelie madness with each passing day. The only one Mac can depend on is the powerful, dangerous immortal Jericho Barrons, but even their fiery bond is tested by betrayal. It's a world where staying alive is a constant struggle, the line between good and evil is blurred, and every alliance comes at a price. In an epic battle against dark forces, Mac must decide who she can trust, and what her survival is ultimately worth. Praise for Burned "Karen Marie Moning is back, delivering the kind of spellbinding, addictive, twisted tale we love to devour. Magic and madness, intrigue and illusion, passion and power, sexual tension and more sexual tension. . . . Burned is a book that shouldn't be missed. Thrilling, suspenseful, sexy--it has all the right stuff to delight the most ardent of Fever fans."--USA Today "Dark, delicious suspense! Karen Marie Moning is my author of choice and Fever is my series of choice for action-packed suspense with a spine-tingling paranormal twist."--#1 New York Times bestselling author Lisa Gardner "A masterwork by an incomparable writer. Burned is brilliant, sexy, and dangerous. I adore Moning! No one does it better."--#1 New York Times bestselling author Sylvia Day "Prepare for a heart-stopping trip into the epic Fever world, filled with gasp-out-loud surprises and sweltering sensuality."--#1 New York Times bestselling author Kresley Cole "Burned gets the highest rating from me. I wanted to run through town shouting 'Mac is back! Mac is back!' Grab some snacks, something to drink, and settle down for a cover-to-cover read that will likely keep you up all night."--New York Times bestselling author Linda Howard "One of the most anticipated books in romance . . . Burned is told through several viewpoints, but the dominating view is Mac's, and it's wonderful to have her back, as well as get to spend time with the two Alphas in her life."--Heroes and Heartbreakers "Deeply complex, heady and action-packed."--RT Book Reviews From the Hardcover edition.