Shield of Winter

Psy-Changeling, Book 13

By: Nalini Singh

Narrated by: Angela Dawe

Length: 15 hrs and 47 mins

Publisher's summary

Assassin. Soldier. Arrow. That is who Vasic is, who he will always be. His soul drenched in blood, his conscience heavy with the weight of all he's done, he exists in the shadows, far from the hope his people can almost touch - if only they do not first drown in the murderous insanity of a lethal contagion. To stop the wave of death, Vasic must complete the simplest and most difficult mission of his life. For if the Psy race is to survive, the empaths must wake....

Having rebuilt her life after medical "treatment" that violated her mind and sought to suffocate her abilities, Ivy should have run from the black-clad Arrow with eyes of winter frost. But Ivy Jane has never done what she should. Now, she'll fight for her people, and for this Arrow who stands as her living shield, yet believes he is beyond redemption. But as the world turns to screaming crimson, even Ivy's fierce will may not be enough to save Vasic from the cold darkness.

©2014 Nalini Singh (P)2014 Tantor

Narrator voice much louder than characters…

…. makes it really annoying to listen. Volume constantly up and down! I don’t recall this being a problem with other Nalini Singh and hope it doesn’t happen again or I won’t be buying them anymore!

One of my favs

This is peobably my 8th-10th relisten.

This is one of my favs in the series. Probably 5th. I love the Arrows and both this and Aidens stories are all the feels.

I guess I really loved the stories in this series in which the MMCs are the psys and the FMCs have emotion. I didn't even consciously realize that until this very moment lol.

Alpha Night & Storm Echo are also favs.

Of course, the top of the list is Heart of Obsidian. It's not only my favorite in the series, but one of my favorite books in general.

Psy changeling is one of my go to series when I need relistens because I'm in a book slump.

I absolutely cannot wait for Resonance Surge to be released on audio in a couple of weeks!

Indulgent fluff. Perfect summer read.

Over the top with repeated descriptives, and I kept asking myself, "why am I still listening?" but this volume is the first to bring my eyes to brimming with emotion at the touching scenes near Vasic's (sp?) surgery. Angela Dawe's male voices are a bit too quiet for "active" listening via head phones or bluetooth speaker. I had to back up and repeat a few conversations to get everything.
Being on the next vokume!

Another Success

The book is wonderful!

The audio is lacking. Angela Dawe is usually amazing; but there seem to be many technical issues. it's almost like it was edited with two or three different audio systems and there are moments where it did get distracting. At times it was even hard to figure out if something was a thought or is actually being said out loud. Some of the accents or voices didn't jive with the first few books. And I think that also caused some confusion, but this is slight.

Exceptional Series

As with all the books in this series I loved it. My only complaint is the next book isn't out yet. If you've not been introduced to these books, I highly recommend them. I've loved each one.

Love this book <br />

I such a beautiful love story. it was about time that they brought the E's forward, they are really making a change

Great job.

Loved it. I like this author and her stories about the psy-changling world. Thank you.

Wonderful Love Story! Ms.Singh never fails!

Loved this one! Wonderful Love Story! Again includes many of the Past Beloved Characters!

Poor quality of recording and Narration

Would you recommend this audiobook to a friend? If so, why?

As always this is a good addition to the series.

What other book might you compare Shield of Winter to and why?

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How could the performance have been better?

Narrator ended each sentence by emphasizing the last word, starting low going high and back to low. Then she would pause. Also the esp. towards the end of the book, the volume would increase, decrease or sound as if it were in a tunnel before reverting back to normal. Very distracting.

Great addition to the series! :D

4.5-5 stars

This was a great story. I've always liked Vasic and was looking forward to his story and Ivy made a good mate for him. After the big blow up in the Psy society in the last book (the over throw of the Silence protocol) I was curious about how the next book would go and I really liked the direction that Singh took the story line. I was sucked in to the story quickly and didn't want to stop until the end.

Ivy is a Psy and a strong empathy but because of the silence protocol (the one that makes all emotions in Psy something to be banished) her abilities have been suppressed all her life. Ivy wasn't able to keep to the silence protocol and went through a major reconditioning when she was 15. This almost turned her in to a vegetable but she managed to pull through eventually (partially because of an injured stray dog she nursed back to health and adopted as a pet). Ivy’s parents, in an effort to protect her, moved their family in to a remote community with a few other Psy and they've been living there for years.

Vasic is a Psy and was born with strong and dangerous abilities. These abilities pushed him in to the Arrow squadron where he was trained from the age of 4 to suppress all emotions, control his powers and become an Arrow (much more strenuous and torturous training than what normal Psy children go through). His training has turned Vasic in to an unfeeling soldier and he thinks he needs his lack of emotions to keep his abilities restrained so he’s safe to others.

Since the end of the silence protocol, Kaleb (the hero from Heart of Obsidian) has pretty much been running the Psy community with the support of the Arrow squad and the other former Councilors, Nakita and Anthony. Kaleb is trying to find a cure for the infection that’s been spreading across the Psy-net. He believes that the empaths (who have had their abilities ruthlessly suppressed up to now) are the key to fixing at least some of the issues on the Psy-net if not the whole disease. Kaleb asks the Arrows to help him test this theory and protect a group of empaths while they try to bring out their power and see what they can do. Vasic ends up leading the team set up to protect the empaths (who are all offered jobs as incentive to join the project) and during his duties he meets Ivy. She’s an empath and although her very presence makes him uncomfortable (something about her emotions bothering his silence) he finds himself drawn to her and wanting to protect her. Vasic ends up making it his mission to keep Ivy and the other empaths safe…even from Kaleb is needed. Ivy hasn't been restrained by the silence protocol since she managed to recover from the reconditioning (although she’s still tried to suppress her emotions as much as she can so they don’t leak out on to the Psy-net). When Ivy first saw Vasic she feared him but once he told her about her ability and offered her the chance to learn more about it, she starts to trust him. When he saves her life from assassins, she feels even closer to Vasic. Ivy joins the project along with some other empaths and they stay in cabins in the Changling territories (with prearranged permission) with Arrows to protect them. As Vasic and Ivy spend more time together (and he continues to protect her and give slight signs of kindness), she starts to feel more for Vasic and wants to touch him (empaths instinctively want touch, especially with those they’re close to) but she restrains herself because she doesn't want to make Vasic uncomfortable and possible make him avoid her.

During their time in the cabins, Ivy and the other empaths learn what they can about their gifts with some help from Sascha (the heroine from Slave to Sensation who is a strong empath), who visits to share with them what she’s learned. Things get worse on the Psy-net though and the spreading disease starts causing more and more outbreaks of violence around the world. Ivy and some of the other empaths (and their arrows) go out in to the more infected areas to see what they can do to help but it’s often not enough for the large amounts of Psy being affected. Vasic determinedly protects Ivy and makes sure she doesn't push herself too far. Although Vasic tried to keep his distance, he slowly starts thinking of Ivy as his. Vasic doesn't believe he deserves Ivy but eventually he doesn't care. As Ivy has spent time with Vasic and seen the kind of man he actually is she believes he’s a good man and has come to care for him. She pushes (gently) to try to get him to acknowledge their bond and not run from it. When Vasic stops fighting her and they start to come together, he has a bit of trouble controlling his powers as they get intimate which causes some interesting results. Their coupling works well though because Arrows tend to serve and don’t think of themselves and empaths tend to take care of people they care about and can be very stubborn so Ivy takes care of Vasic whether he wants her to or not and he gets peace from protecting her. Unfortunately, the net problems aren't their only issue as Vasic's “gauntlet” (an artificial attachment to one of his arms that links in to his mind) starts malfunctioning and they have to attempt to find a way to disable it before it kills Vasic. There are some very interesting times while everyone is scrambling to find the solutions to the multiple different issues. I really liked the way the Psy-net/empath story line played out because once they found the solution, it wasn't big and flashy but it worked for me and seemed believable. The same for Vasic's issue with his gauntlet, it didn't turn out perfect but it worked out as it needed to. Vasic and Ivy…I loved the way things worked for them and was very happy with their resulting relationship and HEA.

I greatly enjoyed this story. Ivy and Vasic are a wonderful couple and was very happy to see them get past their difficulties and come out with a HEA in the end. I also really liked how things turned out for Ivy and the rest of the empaths. There are still issues that need to be faced and I’m certainly looking forward to seeing more when the next book in the series comes out. I’d recommend this book. 2 thumbs up! :D