Shadow Dance

The Offline Series, Book One

De: C. K. Andersson

Narrado por: Samantha Norbury

What would you do if the game you were playing suddenly becomes your reality?

Saga escapes her mundane life of modern stresses and anxieties, a failed relationship and a monotonous job by immersing herself in an online game. When dark whispers begin to invade her mind, she is pulled through a rift into a world eerily reminiscent of the game she plays.

Whatever brought her to this place stalks her at every turn, a sinister siren song calling to her, bringing her closer to a source of power that threatens everything. Trapped in this confusingly familiar world, she must find herself, her strength and allies to help her survive.

Grand Prior Roseheart, the leader of a paladin order, sees the potential and power in Saga. Persuading her to join his order, he is convinced that she is the key to defeating the dark magic that blights the land — but is that all he sees in her?

Saga’s journey through the world of Theadrath is perilous, taking her from the regal city of Whitekeep, audiences with the vampire council, to the elegant cities of the high elves, where Prince Kailunn Sunseeker rules over the land in the absence of his mother, Queen Sunseeker.
Saga knows the fictional Kailunn very well. Her phone’s photo gallery is filled with screenshots and fan art of him — but is the real prince the same as the man on the screen whom she fell in love with, or does he hide secrets behind his soft-spoken words?

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‘Shadow Dance’ is a character-driven dark fantasy novel with romance elements, containing rich lore, a story with compelling stakes and characters that seem effortlessly real. Please refer to the content warnings on Andersson's website.

©2023 C. K. Andersson (P)2023 C. K. Andersson

If you like world of warcraft...

This story has it all, especially if you're a vanilla or bc wow player. Many world of warcraft vibes, the characters are interesting and have wworld of warcraft racial vibes. You wont be disappointed if you're looking for that kind of feel.
The narrator is pleasant to listen to, wonderful job.

Amazing Everything!!!

I can't tell you how much I enjoyed this book. The narration was amazing, the story was amazing, the characters were amazing! I loved seeing how Saga navigated through new lands and how she struggled. This was also my very first Isekai book and now I want more!!! I cannot wait to learn what happens next!

5 ⭐️

Shadow Dance is an amazing, immersive fantasy experience. It starts with Saga, a woman who is literally sucked into a fantasy role-playing game called ‘Reign Online.’ She struggles to get her footing in this new world but eventually accepts her fate and tries to adapt to fit in. She meets knights, elves, and vampires along the way. Saga becomes confused because her loyalty lies with the elves and Kailunn, a prince of the elves in the game; however, she is thrown in with the human knights where she meets a Paladin named Garren. With Garren, Saga realizes she is developing a power which Garren shares. Saga begins to develop conflicting feeling on where her loyalties lie, especially when she meets Kailunn in person. Meanwhile, a malcious villain in this world, Lysander, is trying to gain power and steal some of Saga’s inexplicably developing power. The conflict leaves you on the edge of your seat, and this book leaves you wanting more! Shadow Dance is an amazing read!!! Everyone who loves fantasy will love this book!!!

Immersive Fantasy

This was a very interesting and entertaining immersive fantasy story. Characters where brought to life beautifully by Samantha Norbury and her excellent narration.

That didn’t go where I thought

I can’t wait for the sequel. The performance was exceptional particularly with the multiple voices! As a total nerd I love the idea of a book in a DnD setting. This definitely has an open ending but I can’t wait to see what happens next.

Great Story and a Captivating Narration

5⭐

The Full List of Content Warnings for this book are listed in the book and on the author's website. Always check warnings prior to starting a book if there are certain topics you cannot read.

How can I forget when my heart is now sealed by you, stamped with your sigil?

This story primarily follows Saga Falk (LOVE THAT NAME) as she finds herself in a world very similar to the video game that she has spent most of her life playing. This is where she meets Grand Prior Roseheart (Garren) a man she's not so familiar with because she played the game from the elves side. Garren convinces her to join his order to help with the dark magic that is taking over. All the while Saga has to figure out how she got there.

“I’d welcome them with open arms if it means you’re close to me,” he says softly as he cups my face with his hands. “You speak as if you’re falling in love,” I mutter unsteadily. “I won’t deny the fact that I’m drawn to you. You fascinate me.”

Saga has a pretty rough past, which you will learn a bit about, and as a result of such she kind of used a character, Kailunn, as a way to cope. He's been a fictional character she has been in love with for so long and boy do I get is Saga. i like this man too. She spends a lot of the book not opening up to Garren despite having an attraction because she feels like it's betraying Kailunn in some way. Even when she hadn't met him yet. I'll be honest it got to a point in this book where I was just like girl take them BOTH. Live your best life. Why choose? I don't know if Garren would be into that though. *insert smirky face here*

There's also some pretty cool side characters in this book too. My favorite being Sandro. (He's the cutie to the left of Saga on the cover) His such a golden retriever, I love him. Also like seriously check out all the character art for this book. I saw most of the character art before I even finally had the chance to read the book (I listened to the audiobook alongside, PHENOMENAL by the way.) and as soon as the characters were starting to get described I was like oh my gosh that's "Garren" "Lysander" etc.

I will say the last bit of the book was a sobfest for me. CK just took my heart out of my chest, threw it on the ground and stomped on it over and over. Then the fatal wound of how this ended. I need book two like I need the air in my lungs to breathe. I need to know.

Stunning and Immersive - I did not want it to end.

C.K. writes in such a rare and beautiful style that will quickly immerse you into this world and simply not let you go. The characters are colorful and real and their relationships are surprising and profound. Each character is truly unique and plays a very special role in this story that will sweep you away and leave you wanting more. When is the next book in this series coming? Please hurry - I need to know what happens next :)

And Samantha Norbury brings these brilliant characters and this stunning world to life in a way that perfectly compliments C.K.s amazing storytelling. This is a title in my library that I will listen to many times. I honestly cannot recommend Shadow Dance highly enough. Just get it! You will be taken on a journey that you will never forget.

Cliffhanger

The narrator did an amazing job, especially when the voices when the first person viewpoint kept changing.
To sum up the story, all of a sudden our protagonist is living in the mmorpg that she loved to play for years.
I, personally, loved the plot. The story kept me thirsting for more. Amazing characters and I feel like I know them all personally. But fair warning if you don't like cliffhangers, I would suggest you wait for book #2.

I've made this mistake before

I saw a rating of 4.8-stars on a $4.99 sale and snatched it up because the title sounded interesting. I did not notice that at the time there were only 14 ratings or I would have probably picked a different story. This story has LOTS of problems:
1) The story kept switching perspectives between characters. This wasn't done well and many times I had to mentally reset and figure out which character was the current focus.
2) The story idea had some promise, but it NEVER delivered. The whiny, self-conscious, insecure, and insipid MC had a good starting place with no positive characteristics. If she went through some trials and improved, the story may have been good. Instead, the entire story is the author trying to pass off an angsty G-rated romance as science fiction (see #3) and finally near the very end, the MC had a revelation that she came by not because of hard work and/or deep mental exploration, but because the "hot" Elf prince decided to show her how to dance.
3) Imagine Lady and the Tramp when the dogs suck up the spaghetti and end up kissing when they meet in the middle follow by bashfully turning away. This was the vibe of the entire romance portion of this story. This is cute in a kids film, but not very interesting past the age of ??13??
4) At first thought this book was about an angsty 17-year old with a bad life and that kept me listening so I could find the hook where she worked to overcome her bad life at such a young age. However, fairly early on, the author tells us the character is 29 and I'm like, "say what???"
5) Not a single character was relatable. These were very two-dimensional characters with little if any depth that acted in consistent and rigidly defined ways that were not natural or interesting.

I'm going to stop here because my goal is not to trash the book or author. It takes a lot of guts to put a story out there for people like me to critique who might not like the story. There were 14 people out there before me who gave this story 5-stars, so there is a market for this story. Obviously this story was not for me, but I've been listening on Audible for 20+ years and have 1600 books in my library, so I can be hard to please. To end on a positive note, I think the narrator did a good job!

dnf

I tried to stick it out but it just didn't hit the right notes. She's too calm initially and then too flustered later. I can't connect to the dissonance between logic and emotional responses at times. Her erratic behavior oscillating between someone who takes charge and someone who panics and reacts without thought didn't land for me.