Broken Blade by J. C. Daniels

Love, love, love this series! J. C. Daniels (a.k.a. Shiloh Walker) writes beautifully broken characters and Kit is definitely at her worst in the third book in the Colbana Files. She was utterly destroyed by Jude in the previous book (my thoughts here) and BROKEN BLADE focuses on her recovery. Part of Kit's process? Facing down an ancient being with crazy powers because that's just the kick in the pants that Kit needed to stop hiding and grieving. But the meat of BROKEN BLADE is all about Kit and her journey back to herself. It's a very emotional story and one that I loved, even though there are difficult moments in the story. Kit really was on her way to having it all when Jude kidnapped her and she has a long way to go to get over what happened. As she says, Jude made her into a thing who was trying to kill herself to escape him so there are many steps on her journey, especially when some of the abilities that made Kit who she was are completely gone (at least in Kit's eyes).

The case in BROKEN BLADE was quite interesting. It starts off as something simple and becomes significantly more complex, as is typical of Kit's life. It begins with a pregnant girl who can't get in touch with her baby's father and spirals into something with the potential to rock the foundations of the Non-Human world. The threat is big enough that Kit has to engage with everyone, including Damon, and the scenes between the two of them will tear your heart to pieces. We also get a lot of insight into Doyle and his abilities. In fact, we learn just why he was able to track Kit when no one else could find her -- and the answer was quite a surprise! It's going to be an interesting ride for sure when Daniels develops this plot thread.

It's really hard to talk about BROKEN BLADE without spoiling the journey that Kit experiences so I think I'll close this post here. Daniels has crafted a gripping and emotion-twisting story for Kit and her healing is no less painful to read that her experiences with Jude were in NIGHT BLADE. And as always, I was left wanting more when I hit the final page of this story because Daniels has created a masterpiece series in the Colbana Files -- how can you not want more when the storytelling is this fantastic?

Read an excerpt

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by Tynga at Monday, February 03, 2014

 Adult, Colbana Files, J. C. Daniels, Purchased, Review, Self Published, Shiloh Walker, Urban Fantasy  Leave your mark

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Night Blade by J. C. Daniels

Night Blade by J. C. Daniels

Book stats:
Reading level: Adult
Trade paperback: 250 pages
Genre: Urban fantasy
Publisher: Shiloh Walker, Inc.
Release date: March 4, 2013

Series: Colbana Files #2

Source: Review copy from author

Reviewed by: Jenn

Purchase: Amazon

Kit Colbana is always biting off more than she can chew. She has a knack for finding trouble. This time, though, trouble finds her. Someone from her past drops a case into her lap that she just can't refuse...literally.

People on the Council are dying left and right and she's been requested to investigate the deaths. The number one suspect? Her lover, Damon. If she doesn't clear his name, he gets a death sentence. Even if she succeeds? They still might try to execute him. Oh, and she's not allowed to tell him about the case, either.

The stakes are high this time around, higher than they've ever been. Kit may be forced to pay the ultimate price to save her lover's life...a price that could destroy her and everything she loves.

NIGHT BLADE is the second book in J. C. Daniels' (a.k.a. Shiloh Walker) Colbana Files. I am a huge fan of the first book in the series, BLADE SONG (my thoughts here), and I wasn't sure that the writing could get any better, but it really does in NIGHT BLADE. The stakes are higher, the danger is scarier, and the emotions are stronger and more fraught.

When I talked about BLADE SONG last year, I said:

BLADE SONG has everything I love in an urban fantasy – plucky heroine with major skills, broody love interest, high stakes, fast-paced action and great dialogue.

Because of this, I was confident that NIGHT BLADE would be a great urban fantasy novel but it ended up being so much more. In fact, it's probably my favourite book of 2013 because it's just a delicious, emotional book. Basically, NIGHT BLADE ripped out my heart and stomped all over it. Repeatedly. Particularly towards the end. There aren't a lot of books out there that actually make me well up but NIGHT BLADE came very close to making me bawl because Kit's emotions and experiences are so raw.

Kit and Damon are settling into their romance and adjusting to Damon's new role as Alpha of the cat clan when Kit's ex, Justin, shows up with a mission: help to clear Damon's name for a slew of deaths. It's a great main story since it puts Kit in the position of working with her ex, which doesn't make Damon happy, and because we get some more insights into how Damon's mind works. There are also some nice developments between Kit and Doyle, and I was surprised by just how much I enjoyed their banter and interactions. Kit's quest to clear Damon's name faces some serious obstacles, not the least of which are Justin and Damon, and these challenges makes NIGHT BLADE an addictive read. I don't want to say too much about the outcomes or paths of this storyline since this book is brand new but believe me when I say that you won't be left unsatisfied.

Writing this post is actually surprisingly difficult for me because the meatiest action in NIGHT BLADE happens in the last quarter of the book and I'd hate to spoil things. The story would have been satisfying if the book had ended at about the three-quarters mark but it didn't. Instead, Walker took it to a dark, horrifying place that laid Kit bare in every sense. I was completely shocked by what takes place during this part of the story. Kit is stripped down to her very essence by these events and it has definitely changed her relationships, her worldview, and her soul. It makes me eager for BROKEN BLADE, which doesn't come out until 2014 (not soon enough!) because there's still so much left up in the air, even though this part of the storyline does have some resolution and a logical stopping point. I could talk about this forever since it was such a bold move on Walker's part but I don't want to spoil it for you, and I feel like I've given enough away as it is. Hit me up on Twitter or leave a comment if you've read the book and want to chat about it!.

There's also a really interesting side story that kicks off the novel. Kit has to deliver a package to a group of psycho wolves in Tennessee on behalf of Orlando pack's Alpha. The Tennessee wolves are linked to someone from Kit's past (and present) and I was really hoping to see more of this storyline. Unfortunately, there wasn't a lot of page time devoted to this plot point but it's okay because (a) the Kit/Damon/dead people plot was amazeballs and (b) I hope it was a teaser thread for a future storyline. In any case, I'll only be unhappy if this particular ball gets dropped on the ground and kicked under the sofa, left to gather dust after the series ends. I'm (perhaps disportionately) curious about this dysfunctional group so I hope Daniels will answer my questions soon.

I have nothing but praise for Daniels/Walker and her amazing abilities. If you're looking for something fluffy, NIGHT BLADE is not the book for you. If you're looking for some amazing urban fantasy, then you better get your hands on the Colbana Files post-haste!

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by jenn at Monday, April 08, 2013

 J. C. Daniels, Review, Shiloh Walker  2 People left their mark

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PSC: Story and giveaway by J. C. Daniels (a.k.a. Shiloh Walker)

Our first Paranormal Summer Camp visitor is J. C. Daniels, author of the upcoming urban fantasy novel, BLADE SONG. You probably know her better as Shiloh Walker, author of several series, such as her steamy Grimm novels, her FBI Psychics books, or her erotic paranormal romance series The Hunters. BLADE SONG is a bit different from her other books because it's urban fantasy, not paranormal romance, so be prepared for action and shapeshifters and *maybe* a bit of romance!

Her guest post is an exclusive story about her new protagonist, Kit Colbana. BLADE SONG, the first book in the Colbana Files, is a real treat, and so is this story. Get ready for an awesome introduction to this new world!

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Summer Camp…or as Kit calls it… hell.

Vignette…not part of any story. Just set in the same world as Blade Song

Summer camp.

I was working a case, trying to track down an accountant. He’d thought it would be fun to skip out with some money that belonged to the wolf pack.

They weren’t happy.

If I found him, I got half of the money he’d taken off with…about twenty grand.

Assuming I found him. That was a lot of money. But I had to find him.

Which was why I was at Beautiful Day Summer Camp, located in southern Georgia. The accountant had a kid attending camp here. I was hoping they’d let me talk to her for five minutes. Hoping…but I wasn’t counting on it.

Summer camp.

I could hear kids laughing. Screaming. Squealing.

And for some reason, the sight of that tall, wooden fence had flung me back in time a good fifteen years.

I’d been eleven the first time I was sent to the training camp where my kind went for a month out of each year. If I’d been bigger, stronger, I would have started attending the camp at age nine. As it was, I was still the skinniest, weakest thing there.

Sixteen hours of intense training every day, running mile after mile after mile…learning how to track, how to hunt.

The one good thing that had happened during the training camps…when I was twelve, they put a bow in my hands. If I had been back at Aneris Hall, my home, I don’t know if I would have been given the chance to touch a bow. My grandmother preferred to see me with weapons I just wasn’t very good with. Battle axes. Maces. Things made for people twice my size, with a hell of a lot more strength.

One of the instructors had thrown the bow at me, told me to figure it out. It had been one of the poorer quality bows, and the arrows hadn’t been the greatest, either.

I had found myself a relatively quiet corner and spent a few hours practicing. By the time camp ended that summer, I’d been hitting my target…almost every single time.

Warriors…my kind were warriors. To the disgust of my mother’s family, they’d discovered that summer that even I hadn’t been overlooked.

A week after I left camp, my grandmother had used that bow to beat me.

I don’t have a lot of good memories of my childhood. Only one good memory of anything that might be considered summer camp.

Passing a hand over my mouth, I tried to brace myself to walk through the damn gate.
This shouldn’t be so hard. It was just a bunch of kids.

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More about BLADE SONG:

Kit Colbana—half breed, assassin, thief, jack of all trades—has a new job: track down the missing ward of one of the local alpha shapeshifters. It should be a piece of cake.

So why is she so nervous? It probably has something to do with the insanity that happens when you deal with shifters—especially sexy ones who come bearing promises of easy jobs and easier money.

Or maybe it’s all the other missing kids that Kit discovers while working the case, or the way her gut keeps screaming she’s gotten in over her head. Or maybe it’s because if she fails—she’s dead.

If she can stay just one step ahead, she should be okay. Maybe she’ll even live long to collect her fee…

Jenn's thoughts

Read an excerpt

Purchase: Amazon

You can also check out this free Kit Colbana story on Tor.com.

Other books by J. C. Daniels:

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Enter to win…

Win some blades and books—check out the J. C. Daniels Book Tour! For a full list of the prizes and disclaimer, please visit her blog.

To enter the giveaway, fill out the Rafflecopter form below.

This giveaway is part of the BLADE SONG Blog Tour so the rules are a bit different from the rest of the giveaways in the event. But before I get to that, you're probably wondering what you could win, right? Well, here's the scoop straight from J. C.'s blog:

The bag contains swag from RT, a couple of samplers, as well as a T-shirt and cap from Ellora’s Cave, The Vampire Shrink from Lynda Hilburn, The Wolf Gift from Anne Rice and Cowgirls Don’t Cry by Lorelei James.

The books and bag were picked up for giveaways at RT.

The earrings…I wanted something that was kind of… Kit-like. Kit likes shiny stuff, but usually the sharp short of shiny stuff. So the dagger earrings were perfect.

a Rafflecopter giveaway

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Shiloh Walker has been writing since she was a kid. She fell in love with vampires with the book Bunnicula and has worked her way up to the more…ah…serious works of fiction. She loves reading and writing just about every kind of romance. Once upon a time she worked as a nurse, but now she writes full time and lives with her family in the Midwest. She writes romantic suspense and paranormal romance, among other things. (Author photo by Ayrica Bishop.)

 

Website | Facebook | Twitter

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by jenn at Wednesday, August 01, 2012

 giveaway, Guest Post, J. C. Daniels, Paranormal Summer Camp, Shiloh Walker  22 People left their mark

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Blade Song by J. C. Daniels

 Blade Song by J. C. Daniels

Book Stats:
Reading level: Adult
Genre: Urban fantasy
E-book: 257 pages
Publisher: Shiloh Walker, Inc.
Release date: August 1, 2012

Series: Colbana Files #1

Source: Review copy from author

Reviewed by: Jenn

Purchase: Amazon

Kit Colbana—half breed, assassin, thief, jack of all trades—has a new job: track down the missing ward of one of the local alpha shapeshifters. It should be a piece of cake.

So why is she so nervous? It probably has something to do with the insanity that happens when you deal with shifters—especially sexy ones who come bearing promises of easy jobs and easier money.

Or maybe it’s all the other missing kids that Kit discovers while working the case, or the way her gut keeps screaming she’s gotten in over her head. Or maybe it’s because if she fails—she’s dead.

If she can stay just one step ahead, she should be okay. Maybe she’ll even live long to collect her fee…

Shiloh Walker (a.k.a. J. C. Daniels) is one of those authors who’s been on my radar for a while but I’ve never actually tried, but with BLADE SONG, I could resist no longer! I'm a sucker for strong heroines, daunting tasks, and clever dialogue and BLADE SONG has all this and more.

Kitasa Colbana is one of my favourite new characters of the year. She's got all the hallmarks of a great urban fantasy heroine -- martial skills, a dark past, a strong sense of honour, a quick mind -- and she lives in a very interesting world. In Kit's world, humans know about the creatures that go bump in the night and some people even flock to Orlando, Kit's town, to see what the local shapeshifer population can do. There's even an Assembly of Non-Humans who ostensibly run the non-human populations. As part of a dying race, Kit's not really on the humans' radar but the other supernaturals know her, though they may not know what she is: half-human and half-aneira (or half-Amazon). The aneira have some really neat abilities: they can go invisible, they can sense what other supernaturals are, they can call their weapons to them, and weapons speak to them. In short, their skills give them the ability to be the best assassins, thieves, and hunters. These aren't the abilities we normally see in urban fantasy and I love that J. C. Daniels brings us a heroine with a slightly different flavour. Especially since, being a half breed, Kit was despised by her aneira family, though she's been making her own way in the world since she ran away from her family, and doing quite well up until this point.

Enter this case and Damon, the cat who brings it to her. He starts off as a major d-bag (there really is no other word for it) but he really grew on me -- and Kit -- over the course of BLADE SONG. Damon oozes alpha male for most of the story and it makes him a good if exceptionally frustrating partner for Kit. He and Kit remind me a lot of Kate and Curran from Ilona Andrews' Kate Daniels series. Their relationship has that same tug-of-war feeling and the leads in both series exhibit similar traits. This doesn't mean that BLADE SONG is a remake of MAGIC BITES or anything like that. It's supposed to be a compliment: both worlds are filled with strong characters, creative world building, and plots that will keep you hooked. It just so happens that both of the female protagonists are hell-on-wheels with swords and both men are cats who come off as jerks but end up being quite irresistible. =)

I really enjoyed the main plot line of BLADE SONG. It starts off with a sort of simple mission: to find a missing shifter kid. And then it spirals into a larger mystery, involving a bunch of missing non-human kids. I loved the way the plot unfolded. I was hooked just as soon as Kit was and I was so wrapped up in the story I didn't even want to guess who the bad guy was. I wanted to discover it along with Kit. It's a well written mystery and I read BLADE SONG in a single evening because I needed to know who was behind the missing kids and what was going to happen to him/her when Kit and Damon figured it out.

BLADE SONG has everything I love in an urban fantasy – plucky heroine with major skills, broody love interest, high stakes, fast-paced action and great dialogue. The intensity keeps up throughout the entire novel and I’m absolutely dying to see where Kit goes next after the events of the final pages. I'd recommend this book wholeheartedly to fans of the Kate Daniels series, not just because they're both about fierce ladies with swords but because they're both strongly written stories with a lot of heart.

Read an excerpt (scroll down)

You can also check out our exclusive Kit Colbana short story or this free story on Tor.com.

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by jenn at Wednesday, August 01, 2012

 J. C. Daniels, Review, Shapeshifter, Shiloh Walker  1 Person left their mark

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