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A Shiver of Light
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A Shiver of Light
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A Shiver of Light
Audiobook12 hours

A Shiver of Light

Written by Laurell K. Hamilton

Narrated by Charlotte Hill

Rating: 3.5 out of 5 stars

3.5/5

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Currently unavailable

Currently unavailable

About this audiobook

Merry Gentry, ex-private detective and full-time princess, is now the mother of triplets, a rarity in the high ranks of faerie. And not everyone is happy about it, including Taranis, King of Light and Illusion. He's using the human courts to sue for visitation rights, claiming that one of the babies is his. To save herself and her children, Merry will use the most dangerous powers in all of faerie: a god of death, a warrior known as the Darkness, the Killing Frost, and a king of nightmares. They are her lovers, and her dearest loves, and they will face down the might of the high courts of faerie-while trying to keep the war from spreading to innocent humans in Los Angeles, who are in danger of becoming collateral damage.


From the Paperback edition.
LanguageEnglish
Release dateJun 3, 2014
ISBN9780698163720
Unavailable
A Shiver of Light
Author

Laurell K. Hamilton

Laurell K. Hamilton is the author of the New York Times bestselling Anita Blake series and Merry Gentry series. She lives with her family in St. Louis, Missouri.

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Reviews for A Shiver of Light

Rating: 3.354999944 out of 5 stars
3.5/5

200 ratings25 reviews

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  • Rating: 4 out of 5 stars
    4/5
    I read this book immediately after reading Dead Ice and the difference is notable. This series lacks the overt misogyny of the Anita Blake series, though there is an undercurrent.The book takes a nice break from Hamilton's bad erotica as Merry can't have sex until she heals from giving birth. This allowed Hamilton to focus on the interpersonal relationships and negotiations and the politics of the alternate reality she has created.The book felt incomplete, as if it should have been about twice as long. There were a lot of cliffhangers and unresolved issues. I hope Hamilton knows where she is going, as she has created some very interesting potentialities and I'd rather not see this turn into an endless series with no resolution.Overall it was more satisfying than much of Hamilton's recent writing, and if you like the series the book will be enjoyable if a bit frustration.Worth reading, but you can let the library store it for you.
  • Rating: 3 out of 5 stars
    3/5
    LKH is one of my favorite authors. I love the Merry Gentry series. I love the Anita Blake series, but after the last couple of AB books somehting was bothering me. Finally!! Getting to read this book, after waiting a very long time for it, I figured out what it is. LKH is getting a little....soft. The action when barely there. There were times in her earlier books that I was actually grossed out, but that just added to the appeal for me. The heroines are getting a little mushy when they should be getting harder. The very alpha men are bending in ways that go against their charactors. I am not giving up on either series yet becuase I love them so much, but I hope the next books are more reminiscent of the beginning ones. Otherwise, I just may.
  • Rating: 2 out of 5 stars
    2/5
    Merry gives birth; the men in her life try to discern the fathers of the babies. Old enemies try to use the babies for their own ends. After having just given birth, Merry is unable to have intercourse but BDSM is still worked into the book. Coming after the last Anita Blake book, I conclude that Laurell K. Hamilton is out of ideas and is just coasting on her reputation. It has been a long time since one of her books has enthralled me. I will continue to read her books in the hopes they get better, but I will be borrowing them from the library instead of actually buying them.
  • Rating: 3 out of 5 stars
    3/5
    From Fantastic Fiction:

    Merry Gentry pretends to be human. She moved to Los Angeles and began working as a private investigator at Grey's Detective Agency. But all of this is just a disguise; in fact she is a princess of faerie, her real name is Meredith Nic Essus, and she had to flee the Dark Court of Faerie because of attempts on her life.

    In order to inherit her rightful crown, Merry needed to conceive an heir, a notoriously difficult task for the slow-reproducing Fey. In the 2009 novel Divine Misdemeanors, Merry had finally achieved that goal - and fans have been kept waiting all this time to find out what happens!

    My Thoughts:

    The last book in this series was written five years ago. That is a very long time to go on a series that is as sometimes complicated as this one...either that or it was the world's longest pregnancy. The waiting is over and triplets have arrived. Okay...that takes care of ten pages. After waiting, for what felt like forever, for a new Merry book, I was rather disappointed in this book. It just seemed to go on and on in detailed description about everything, never getting to an actually point. I actually skipped pages at times to work through some of the longer, descriptive parts that had no merit.

    One of the most important parts of the book was not even written in detail like all the other less significant topics in the book. This oversight took away from a pretty sad, dramatic part of the book. I wish she would have focused more on that and less on describing the color of people's hair or things that happened in the past.

    I'm not sure if Laurell Hamilton is just tired or what, but you can tell this book was not up to the same levels as the others. I also thought that it read like a final effort on her part.

  • Rating: 4 out of 5 stars
    4/5
    Finally new Merry Gentry book and I'm happy to say that I enjoyed it.

    It wasn't very action packed but it was nice to see what's going on in their lives. We see some new sides about Andais which was nice.
    I have to confess I was little relieved when discovering who's going to die. Glad it wasn't my fav character...

    One problem I have is that there's so many characters in the series and they just keep coming. I don't think we need so many minor characters who has nothing to do in the big picture.
  • Rating: 2 out of 5 stars
    2/5
    Merry gives birth; the men in her life try to discern the fathers of the babies. Old enemies try to use the babies for their own ends. After having just given birth, Merry is unable to have intercourse but BDSM is still worked into the book. Coming after the last Anita Blake book, I conclude that Laurell K. Hamilton is out of ideas and is just coasting on her reputation. It has been a long time since one of her books has enthralled me. I will continue to read her books in the hopes they get better, but I will be borrowing them from the library instead of actually buying them.
  • Rating: 3 out of 5 stars
    3/5
    Merry and her band of friends and lovers enter new territory as the babies are born. Powerful as they are there is a learning curve to newborns, especially for the magically inclined. Taranis is still a royal pain, I hope he gets his just deserts in death- that remains to be seen. Something immortal and unstable as he deserves to be stopped permanently. Andais seems to have settled down for now, trying to be who Meredith wants her to be for the grandchildren. Yet this book has a true ring of sadness, there is much tears and shock. And what happens to king Sholto... It is just not fair...
  • Rating: 4 out of 5 stars
    4/5
    This is the long awaited ninth book in the Merry Gentry series. For the fans of the series, you should give this a read. It feels like the way Hamilton used to write and I liked it.We finally learn more about Meredith, her kings and her babies in the latest installment to this series. What I enjoyed the most was that the sex didn't drown the story. There was enough that it complimented the flow of the overall plot which was a breath of fresh air.We also learned a little bit more about Meredith's mettle and what makes her tick.Would I recommend this book? Yes.
  • Rating: 3 out of 5 stars
    3/5
    Synopsis: Merry finally has the babies and the men still don't know who is responsible for which or any of the children. Merry's uncle and aunt are still trying to victimize her but the Goddess is still sending her blessings.Review: There is lots of info about how someone goes through the throws of hormones after birth. The plot dwells on the relationships between Merry and her uncle and Merry and her Aunt and what they might do to her men and the children. Beyond that, the plot wasn't much.
  • Rating: 3 out of 5 stars
    3/5
    It was nice to hear what is going on in Merry Gentry's world, but after waiting 5 years I do wish there had been a bit more substance to this. It kind of felt like diary entries of what happened around the birth of the triplets. I do hope she come back to Merry's world again, with perhaps a more interesting plot. Overall, enjoyable.
  • Rating: 5 out of 5 stars
    5/5
    I really liked this one. I like the Merry Gentry series better nowadays than the Anita Blake series. It feels fresher and, and at least in this one, there was less explicit sex than in the earlier ones. There wasn't much plot in this one but a fair amount of world-building and revisiting characters seen in previous books. Merry is cutting back on the number of her lovers so there are fewer characters to remember.
  • Rating: 4 out of 5 stars
    4/5
    I was so happy to finally read the long awaited next book in the Merry Gentry series. I was not disappointed. The babies finally make an appearance and the fathers show what they are made of. The political intrigue continues with Tarranis and Andrais. I can't wait for the next book in the series. Highly recommend this book.
  • Rating: 4 out of 5 stars
    4/5
    The story begins with Merry learning that she is not having twins but rather triplets. Almost immediately thereafter she does - two girls and a boy. Now the issue of which of her lovers are the fathers of her children needs to be answered. It especially needs to be answered so that King Taranis of the Seelie Court doesn't get control of any of them. Besides being Merry's uncle, he is also crazy, and very, very powerful. One of his powers lets him come to Merry in dreams and threaten and try to coerce her. Merry also has to deal with her Aunt Andais who is the Queen of Air and Darkness and also crazy. Having an aunt who tries to kill her when she was six, makes Merry very unwilling to let her anywhere near her babies but her power makes her someone they don't want to offend. Especially since Andais feels that she can call back Merry's guards and lovers at any time. The story was fast-paced and filled with the twisted politics of faerie. It was also filled with the love that Merry has for all her lovers and her children. The point is made that Merry is building a new faerie that is ruled by love rather than the capricious actions of her aunt Andais or her uncle Taranis. Merry's new relationship with the goddess is not only expanding the reach of faerie into Los Angeles but also bring fertility to the previously infertile members of faerie who are part of her court. I enjoyed this story very much.
  • Rating: 3 out of 5 stars
    3/5
    Ok, so not up to the same level as the earlier Meredith books, but was not as dismal as other readers made it out to seem. I do feel that more could be done with the characters and almost feel that The muse was not finished, but forced to finish due to dead lines. Hope that the next installment will go back to former level.
  • Rating: 4 out of 5 stars
    4/5
    Our Review, by LITERAL ADDICTION's Pack Alpha - Chelle:*Copy gifted in exchange for an honest reviewI hadn't realized just how much I missed these characters until they were finally back. This book was an unexpected gift. I had thought the series was over, left to just sort of die out with unanswered questions, and then I saw that book #9 was actually going to be released. When I got asked to read for review I immediately jumped in. There was a lot to love in this book... Some incredibly sweet moments, a lot of healing and some additional character growth, a bit of action (not quite as much as past installments), some tragedy - yes I cried - and a bit of surprise (though it was mostly hinted at from the beginning). It also brought some closure, and yet left openings for either more installments or a spinoff if Laurell is so inclined.All in all, I was personally happy with it and very glad us long time fans got the chance to step back into this world! I'd love to tell you all more, but there isn't much I can say in more detail without there being spoilers about how Merry gets back at her uncle, what happens with her crazy aunt, which of Merry's men end up being the father, where the tragedy occurs, what magical gifts her babies end up having (or how many there actually ends up being), what happens with faery, etc. So let me say this much... you know I was happy with it. Would I recommend it for MERRY GENTRY fans? 100%! Would I recommend it for new readers, yes, but I do believe that the rest of the series should be read in order before you jump into A Shiver of Light.
  • Rating: 4 out of 5 stars
    4/5
    So much happens in such a short time in this book. The babes are born -- each with multiple and different fathers and thus different powers. Taranis overplays his hand and loses his throne, but the cost is Sholto's life. Frost is mortal, therefore the courts will be even more afraid of Merry. The Western Lands are growing. Bryluen -- Sholto, Royal, Kitto. Gwenwhfhar -- Rhys, Galen, Mistral. Alastair -- Doyle, Frost.
  • Rating: 2 out of 5 stars
    2/5
    Took me a while b/c I was away, and it was too hefty to drag with me. Lack of an overarching story didn't thrill me.
  • Rating: 5 out of 5 stars
    5/5
    love it!!!
  • Rating: 1 out of 5 stars
    1/5
    I hate to be mean but this was really bad (Sorry Laurell).

    This book has killed the series for me and possibly all of her books (which is sad cause I loved her books). It felt so lazy like she didn’t want to be writing about Merry at all.

    As with most of her books, there’s a lot of recapping of previous books events (feels like she’s trying to up her word count here) and really detailed descriptions of people’s looks (the fabric and exact colour of that dudes shirt has no influence on anything. Upping the word count again maybe). The character’s discuss the same matters over and over and over, bringing nothing new to the table.

    There are two major events in this book, one at the beginning and one at the end. The rest of the book is just filler, covering topics mentioned numerous times in all of the previous books. How many times do we have to hear that Merry’s Dad was a great guy? How many times do we have to hear that her aunt is way into torture? How many times do we have to hear that her uncle is a nutjob? And don’t get me started on those dang nails!

    Near the beginning of the book she wrote a sentence that grated at my skin so much, it was really difficult to continue reading. She’s describing a pair of sunglasses that Mistral puts on; ” They were silver metal frames with mirrored lenses that reflected everything like a silver mirror.” Good God this woman has 3o books (bestsellers no less) under her belt, I know she’s better than this! She also reuses common phrases in a short space of time more than once throughout the book. It almost gives the impression she thinks her readers are stupid or have really bad memories but I think she just didn’t care about this book.

    A Shiver of Light was written 5 years after the last book in the series, and after reading it I get the feeling she only wrote it because she felt she had to. It is boring and lazy and destroyed Merry’s story. This series should have been shorter and finished by now.
  • Rating: 3 out of 5 stars
    3/5
    2 ½ Stars

    Talk, babies, talk, dreams, oral sex, talk, babies, talk, dreams, oral sex, and... finally some action on the last pages, including a death I didn't see coming.

    You should read this book if you are a fan of this series. Keep away if you are new to it.
  • Rating: 2 out of 5 stars
    2/5
    1.5*Book source ~ LibraryPrincess Merry Gentry is very pregnant and more than ready for the babies to make an appearance when she finds out she’s having triplets instead of twins. What?! Before the news can really sink in she goes into labor a few weeks earlier than expected and the next thing she knows she has three babies and she’s alone in her body again. However, her troubles are far from over. King Taranis is still bat shit crazy and claiming paternity of one or all of the babes, Queen Andais is cutting a bloody swath through her court, refugees from faerie flee to Merry and her men and they need a steady plentiful income to support everyone. It’s just another day/week/month in the life of a Princess of Faerie. Will they all survive?I’m not sure where to start in how bad this book truly is. Were it not for a kernel of corn of interesting plot lending a bit of color to this big brown steamy pile of shit I would have given this book a DNF rating. Andais the bat shit crazy aunt wants to visit the babies and Taranis the bat shit crazy uncle claiming paternity to at least one baby are the two things that kept me going. In particular, I wanted to see how they would deal with Taranis. In the end I couldn’t really decide if the climax was worth my time. Probably not considering my favorite of Merry’s men dies and another loses his immortality. Really?! I slogged through this torturous writing for that? GAH!Regurgitation, reiteration and repetition are definitely a problem for LKH. I’ve seen it happen with more frequency in the Anita Blake series, but seriously? This book wins the bloody prize. Let me list my reasons as to why.1.Repetition of fact dumping ~ I lost track of the number of times the reader is told about:a.the nails the soldiers wearb.what everyone looks likec.who each of Merry’s men were before they lost most of their powers and started getting them backd.who Andais and Taranis are, what court they rule and what their powers aree.everyone’s powers are listed multiple times in case we didn’t see it the first timef.how the Goddess and God (or Consort) have blessed Merry and her men because the arrogant Sidhe won’t listeng.how Merry likes it during oral sexh.the names of the babies and why those names were chosen only to not have them called those names at all in the epilogue2.Crying ~ Seriously. Merry spends more time crying than almost anything else and blaming it on baby hormones.3.Conversations ~ Stilted and useless, for the most parta.including a person’s name in every fucking sentenceb.including a person’s nickname in every fucking sentencec.putting ‘my’ or ‘our’ in front of people’s names in every fucking sentence (ex. my Merry, our Killing Frost)d.having conversations about shit that everyone already knows about and lived through as if it’s all new info to the people involved4.Old favorites ~ LKH has many words, phrases and types of scenes she likes to repeat over and over again. The one I’m most sick of? Spill. Hair spills, clothes spill, people spill into a room and guys spill instead of cumming. Find another word, for fuck’s sake!5.Need mo’ money ~ Can someone tell me why they need more money? And why they keep talking about it? Andais and Taranis don’t have an income, right? How do they support their courts? The sithen, right? Merry has her own slice of faerie, so why do they need money? I hope I’ve hit the high points. It’s been a couple days since I read this and I’ve tried very, very hard to wipe it out of my memory. If I had to list what pissed me off the most about this book then I’d have to say all of #1 and #3 of my list. I’m 46-yrs-old. I read, on average, about 250 books a year. I’m no dabbler in the reviewer world. I like to think I have a good handle on how well-written or shoddy a book is. IMHO, this is just piss poor writing. Pages upon pages of filler wasting my time and frustrating the shit out of me. This book is pathetic.To sum it all up, this book is a mess. It’s not even a hot mess. It was like LKH phoned it in over a static-filled cell connection while she was taking a dump after hot wing night. What it needs is an editor who has the power to actually EDIT. And then there’s the ending. I mentioned my favorite of her men is killed. Pointlessly, I felt. But whatever. Should there be another book, I won’t be reading it. LKH, you may think you know what you are doing and your sycophants see no problem licking your ass, but they are doing you no favors when they worship your every word as gospel handed down from on-high. It’s shit. Plain and simple. You built a wonderful world that I couldn’t wait to read more about with each book, but then it degenerated into…this. Your publisher should be embarrassed that they actually printed this garbage. I never used to have you on the same list (Shit Writing) as Stephenie Meyer and EL James, but this book has just landed you on that list. And that makes me sad.
  • Rating: 3 out of 5 stars
    3/5
    A Shiver of Light is the ninth book in Laurel K Hamilton’s Merry Gentry series featuring an exiled fairy princess, the descendant of a fertility goddess, and her multitude of handsome consorts. It has been a long wait for the return of Princess Meredith NicEssus, five years in fact, since the publication of Divine Misdemeanors.A Shiver of Light picks up a short time after the events of Divine Misdemeanors with Merry now heavily pregnant with what was assumed to be twins but is quickly revealed to be triplets. The babies are born, a boy and two girls, fathered by not one but six of her lovers, each child sharing genetic traits with at least two of the men, though paternity has not yet been formally established. It is this uncertainty that has Taranis, King of Light and Illusion, who raped Merry early in her pregnancy, insisting he also has a claim on the children, and with his powers newly restored he begins a frightening campaign to take Merry away from her lovers, and make her his queen.I have to admit I was somewhat disappointed in the story. There is so much potential that just seems wasted between repetitive descriptions of Merry’s men, far too much talk and very little action. There are a couple of confrontations through the story with Taranis and Queen Andais but most of the excitement, and the single twist, is crammed into the last 30 pages or so.The only characters to show any real growth in this installment are Galen, who is galvanised by fatherhood, and Queen Andais who is trying to curb her psychotic tendencies in order to forge a relationship with Merry and the babies. Merry is either drowning in hormone induced hysteria for a lot of the novel, or desperately horny. She doesn’t spend a lot of time with her children, leaving their care to their fathers and a phalanx of nannies despite apparently breastfeeding. I am really interested to see how the babies play into the continuing story though. At only a few days old, all three are displaying immense magical abilities.Despite devouring A Shiver of Light in a couple of hours, in retrospect it was a fairly weak story which failed to live up to expectation. Still I know I will be picking up the next one simply because I am not quite ready to say goodbye… even if I have to wait another five years.
  • Rating: 3 out of 5 stars
    3/5
    Just how much you'd like or dislike this story will depend greatly on whether or not you enjoy a lot of detail and back story.After a five year break, we finally get a new story. The babies are born early in the book and it’s apparent right away that they are very powerful, and just how the heck do you teach a newborn the difference between right and wrong? Taranis is still causing problems with his delusion that the babies are his and that Merry wants to be with him and just needs saving from her Unseelie captives. Andais has worked hard to be sane and wants to see her brother’s grandchildren. Maeve is back. Some of the Seelie have also exiled themselves to join Merry in the hopes of having a baby, although their long-held attitudes about the Unseelie haven’t changed. And the God and Goddess are still working through Merry. So yes, I’m happy that we finally get a reunion with the characters, cultures and the interesting world created in this series.The fact that the book reads like a number of small acts in a play with a great deal of filler is disappointing. A large amount of ink is concentrated on the back story on every character and things that happened in prior books, very detailed descriptions of every character and their clothing, including what they’re wearing in every scene, long-winded conversations surrounding every action that tend to wander, and a lot of contemplation. And even though she can’t have intercourse yet, long, very detailed scenes on needs being met. I got the impression that in doing this the author was reintroducing herself to the world and characters, or to a new audience. And you can’t just skim over any of these areas because you’d miss out on tidbits that explain fears, emotions, prior happenings that are new to us and new issues to yet be tackled or faced. The stress and hormone changes are really getting to Merry. Expect a lot of crying as well as a lot of love and compassion. Not a great deal of action, although what there is, is pretty big. Also expect some continuity issues from prior books and conclusions that are glossed over in comparison to all the detail given on other things. And we’re given a couple of big surprises and don’t know yet how those will play out.So yes, while I enjoyed a visit with old friends after such a long break, I’m disappointed that too much of it was a recap of what we already knew.
  • Rating: 3 out of 5 stars
    3/5
    I'm giving it 3stars only because I'm remembering the past...not because the book really deserves it. There is really no plot. Only a series of unimportant events and repeated assertions...until the end, where in the last couple of chapters all go upside down and you can only think «why?!»
  • Rating: 2 out of 5 stars
    2/5
    *Sigh* Like with her Anita series, the constant off topic or inappropriate rambling tends to get to you. For example, Frost gets hurt and Meredith is worried about him. Something happens with Mistral and the weather so Meredith kisses him to calm him down. THEN all of a sudden she HAS to tell him that she cant have 'intercourse' with him because she just had the babies (which she has already said like 20 times in the last couple chapters) and goes on to say she can do 'oral and hand' on all her men. Then people start talking about who will get to go first, who will give it up and wait, etc etc... Oh yeah Frost is hurt, she lets him rest in bed and goes to the extra room with the lucky two winners. Laurell also tends to go into detail about inconsequential matters or things she just went into detail about in a chapter or two before. It becomes repetitive and ruins the flow of the story.I wish I could say the storyline made up for this but the fact is that sex, talking about the views on bi/gay men and their polyamorous lifestyle is pretty much the only thing happening in SHIVER OF LIGHT. Huh, I guess I had more to say about this than I thought.* This book was provided free of charge from the publisher in exchange for an honest review