Shadow Warrior by Christine Feehan – Dual Review, Excerpt & Giveaway
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Description:
Vittorio Ferraro is a man whose family loyalty knows no bounds. He would die for his siblings and the people they love, but what he really wants is to start a family of his own. Deep down, Vittorio has always known finding a woman who could ride shadows would be nearly impossible—let alone one who could accept his particular needs—and he never expected to find her in the middle of a kidnapping.…
Grace Murphy has always been drawn to Vittorio Ferraro—or at least to the billionaire’s public bad-boy persona. Now that she’s under his protection and the sole focus of his intense caring, she can’t help wanting to get as close to him as possible. But Grace knows her presence is putting the entire Ferraro family in danger. Her monster of a brother will never let her go, but Vittorio has no intention of losing the woman whose shadow matches his own.
Barb’s Review:
Shadow Warrior by Christine Feehan is the 4th book in her wonderful Shadow Riders series. As I have mentioned before, I love this series, as the premise though paranormal, it is different and fantastic. Refresher: Shadow riders have the ability to blend themselves to the shadows wherever they are, making themselves invisible to anyone. They have been in existence for centuries, with all members of their families trained to use those abilities. The family runs a legitimate business; they use their ability to help others in need to solve various problems and dispense justice. They are an extremely powerful and close-knit family that is totally loyal to one another, also protecting the people that in live in their community.
Vittorio Ferraro is our hero in Shadow Warrior. We meet Vittorio when he is privately thinking that his brothers have all found their mates, but accepts the fact that this will never happen to him. Vittorio is tough, dominant and knows no woman would ever meet his standards. When he feels vibes that something is wrong and pulling him to go to their club, he comes across some gang members in the club, who are not allowed there. He then tries to come the rescue of a young guy, pushed by the gangsters, into giving them his girl as collection for a big debt; and all hell breaks loose. The girl is seriously hurt, and Vittorio manages to bring in help, and get the girl to the hospital.
Grace Murphy, our heroine, wakes up in the hospital after having major surgeries, and sees Vittorio, whom she only knew from afar. As she goes in and out of consciousness, she over hears him tell the doctor and nurses that he is her fiancée, and with each passing day, still unable to communicate well, Grace sees that Vittorio stays with her constantly. He tells her he will take care of her, and to use the guise of being his fiancée to keep her safe. But Vittorio knows that Grace, unbeknownst to her, is a shadow rider, and his mate; he has no intention of letting her go, but has to convince Grace that she is meant for him.
When he gets to take her home, with all the Ferraro’s working together to keep her safe from the boy (who grew up with her in foster homes, and is like a brother; but a very dangerous and mentally ill person). The entire Ferraros are pulled into trying not only to keep Grace safe, but also to keep all members of their family safe from this crazy violent ‘brother’. They also have to deal with the Saldi crime family, who started this all by having some of their men at the club and involved in the shooting. There is a lot of violence, and the Ferraros are determined to not become involved in a war.
While this is going on, Grace slowly recuperates, and over a short period of time, she finds herself falling in love with Vittorio, as well as getting used to his dominance. Grace was a great heroine, and even though she put up with her bad evil ‘brother’, she also helped co run a successful business. Vittorio is beside himself that this beautiful woman is made for him and though he is dominant, he is determined to marry her. Their romance heats up fast, with steamy sex scenes. More into this shortly. I did like Grace and Vittorio together, as they made a great couple. I love the whole Ferraro family, and the premise of this series is awesome. I look forward to Emme’s story, and frankly can’t stand the mother.
This was also a very sensual romance, as Feehan had a lot of sex scenes between our couple. The intense pulse pounding story was exciting, but as I stated earlier, I did feel that the sex scenes a bit too many. If you enjoy the many steamy sexual scenes that possibly takes forefront to the story, then this is perfect for you. But if you prefer more story, and a bit less sex, be warned.
What follows is an exciting adventure, where both Grace is in constant danger, and Vittorio is desperate to find the man who threatens her life; with the entire Ferraro family working hard to help find him.
What I love the most about this series is all the wonderful characters that Feehan has created. I love all of the Ferrero’s, and those they fall in love with that join the family. They are an awesome family, with amazing abilities that make this so much fun.
Shadow Warrior is a captivating, exciting, suspenseful, action packed story, with a wonderful couple that steams the pages. The storyline involving the Saldi’s remains open, and I suspect will play a large part in the next book. This is a fantastic paranormal series that you should be reading, and very well written by Christine Feehan.
Sandy’s Review
SHADOW WARRIOR is the fourth instalment in Christine Feehan’s contemporary, adult SHADOW paranormal, erotic romance series focusing on The Ferraro family- a group of ‘Shadow Riders’-who are able to ‘use and ride’ shadows, to move about in secret. This is Vittorio Ferraro, and events planner and business owner Grace Murphy’s story line. SHADOW WARRIOR can be read as a stand alone without any difficulty. Any important information from the previous story lines is revealed where necessary.
SOME BACKGROUND: The Shadow rider male must find his mate –a woman who is capable of riding the shadows-or at the very least with the ability to bear children with the shadow-riding gene. Within the family, the Ferraro siblings are tasked with finding a mate, fated by DNA, who is capable of continuing the family line. The Ferraro’s are also part of the Chicago Underworld-a crime family linked to both legal and criminal activity.
Told from dual third person perspectives (Vittorio and Grace) SHADOW WARRIOR follows in the wake of Grace Murphy’s abduction and her desperate attempts to protect the man with whom she would fall in love. Used as a bargaining chip for payment of a debt, Grace Murphy would find herself in a hostage situation but a gun fight at a local club owned by the Ferraro family finds our heroine placing herself in danger in order to prevent another death. Enter Vittorio Ferraro, a shadow rider and a member of the Ferraro Crime family, and the man with whom Grace would fall in love. What ensues is the building relationship and romance between Vittorio and Grace, and the potential fall-out as Grace’s past targets everyone she loves including our story line heroine.
Vittorio Ferraro knows Grace Murphy is his fated mate the instant their ‘shadows’ merge and entwine but Grace is unaware of her own family history having spent most of her life in an abusive foster care situation. Hoping to prove to Grace he is not the playboy of reputation and media stories, Vittorio plans a slow seduction of our story line heroine, a seduction that is hindered by family secrets, his mother’s attitude, and Grace’s need to recover and heal. The $ex scenes are intimate, erotic and intense, without the use of over the top, sexually graphic language and text. Unlike many of the author’s other series, this story line does not focus primarily on the $ex-in fact, our couple do not make love or engage in $ex until the 61% mark of the story.
Once again, there is a large ensemble cast of secondary and supporting characters including all of Vittorio’s siblings-Emmanuelle, Taviano, Stafano (Francesa), Giovanni (Sasha), Ricco (Marika) and their mother Eoisa Ferraro, as well as a number of cousins, all of whom are shadow riders, working as security, assassins, and business specialists. The requisite evil has many faces including Grace’s foster brother Haydon Phillips, and the Saldis crime family, who may or may not declare war against the Ferraro family.
SHADOW WARRIOR is a story of family, loyalty, secrets, power and control. The premise is intriguing, imaginative and entertaining; the characters are intelligent, energetic and colorful; the romance is spicy and hot. There were some issues of repetition but such is the style of Christine Feehan, repetition that she uses to reiterate some facts and information.
Reading Order and Previous Reviews
Shadow Rider
Shadow Reaper
Shadow Keeper
Shadow Warrior
Copies provided by Publisher
She was like everyone else, following the life of the Ferraros in magazines bought at the grocery store or flipped through at the beauty parlor. She’d always been drawn to Vittorio, finding herself reading every single thing about him. Now, here he was in person, sprawled out in a chair, more beautiful than the photographs could capture, as big as life. Bigger even, the reality of him taking up an enormous amount of space, his wide shoulders and long legs keeping her attention riveted on him.
She groaned aloud and covered her red face with one hand. He’d been there every single day. Right there. In that chair. Pacing around the room. Talking on his cell. It didn’t matter what he was doing, he saw to her every need. He noticed before she did that her pain level was rising, and he took care of it. He didn’t like the food they were serving her, and she was given catered, very nutritious meals for breakfast, lunch and dinner. She hadn’t been able to feed herself those first few days and he had been the one to sit on the edge of her bed and feed her.
The first week after she’d been shot and operated on, there’d been so much pain she could barely breathe, and she hadn’t been able to fully comprehend who he was. Mostly, she’d slept and thought she was dreaming. One of the nurses had referred to him as her fiancée and she had been confused. She’d started to correct her, but then looked beyond her to see Vittorio Ferraro hovering behind the woman.
Their eyes had locked. Had she known that eyes like his existed in real life? She’d been captivated. Spellbound. Unable to think. Those eyes had turned her brain to mush. Her heart had leapt to her throat. Grace had felt as if he was willing her not to speak, not to contradict what the nurse was saying—and she hadn’t. Then the morphine had kicked in and the pain had gone enough for her to drift off.
“Grace?”
His voice. It was beautiful. Low. Soothing, yet at the same time, there was absolute command, as if he ruled the world and knew it. She’d heard that voice in the parking lot, stopping everyone, giving him the chance to act, to save her from the two men Haydon was selling her to for his debts.
Vittorio remained silent after just saying her name. She couldn’t help but look at him, that tone compelled her to raise her gaze to his no matter how reluctant she was. It took her a few moments to gather the courage to meet those eyes. Deep blue, like the deepest, clearest sea. She felt as if she were drowning when she looked into his eyes.
She touched her tongue to her lips—the lips he’d personally applied lip balm to—and lifted her lashes. At once she had the strange sensation of falling, of tumbling into those dark depths, and there was no saving herself. Her heart beat wildly and, in her veins, there was a rush of heat that spread through her body like a wildfire.
“Tell me what’s wrong.”
She had no idea how he could make her want to tell him the truth, no matter that she wanted to hide it from him. She didn’t want to admit that he was the problem, that he was that fantasy she went to bed with every night, and now he was there, larger than life, and way more than she could ever handle. She’d watched him at every charity event, sometimes nearly forgetting her job, which was to stay behind the scenes and make certain everything ran smoothly.
“Grace.”
Again with the name. It sounded so different when he said it. She’d always thought her name plain. Old-fashioned. When Vittorio said it in that enthralling tone, she liked the way it sounded.
Christine’s Feehan’s publisher is graciously offering a paper copy of
SHADOW WARRIOR to ONE lucky commenter at The Reading Cafe.
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