The Phantom King

Kings Series, Book 2

By: Heather Killough-Walden

Narrated by: Antony Ferguson

Siobhan Ashdown was born of magic; it rides her blood like a phantom, tainted and dark and unpredictable. She is a warlock, and the power within her is unlike any before known to her kind. So it's no surprise that the most powerful of the demons who feed off of this warlock magic not only recognizes the enormous potential she represents but determines that he will possess her at any cost.

Even if it means war with the entire supernatural world.

Thanatos has ruled Purgatory as the Phantom King since time immemorial. King of a vast plane of solitude, he is a free spirit, a lone rider, a tattooed man of wind and dust and nonexistent boundaries. Then he turns around one morning to find himself face-to-face with Siobhan Ashdown, a woman with hair as red and wild as his soul, eyes like melted gold, and a spirit as elusive as his own. Time stops, the world tilts, and the fact that she attacks him right off the bat does little to deter his romantic convictions - or his desire to sink his fangs into her neck.

Thirteen Kings are severed by lust and greed, an ancient vampire and his rogue creation lay claim to what is not theirs, the whisperings of war begin to shake the foundation of the supernatural world, and primordial evil awakens from its slumber to slither across the land in this second installment in Heather Killough-Walden's Kings series.

©2012 Heather Killough-Walden (P)2013 Tantor

Much better than the first...

I admit that the first book The Vampire King was a let down and allowed me to judge the entire series. I came back to the series six months later to give this a listen and was pleasantly surprised. If you are like me, give this a chance. The relationship between Thanos and Chevon is much better and there’s more story building. Seemed like book one was a trial run and the writing got much better with this.

A solid follow-up to a good foundation

What made the experience of listening to The Phantom King the most enjoyable?

Compared to The Vampire King, I felt the chemistry between Siobhan and Thane was much more believable than Roman and Evelyn, so I enjoyed the book overall, more than the first one. In general, I thought everything she brought up in this one was more interesting than the first.

What aspect of Antony Ferguson’s performance would you have changed?

Ok so here's what I'm going to say about his performance and I will leave it at that: On an episode of Family Guy I saw one time, Peter and the guys cause a ruckus in a pub, and a British guy convinces them to leave using his "superior linguistic skills." This is how I feel, more or less, about British narrators. I mean, c'mon Ferguson, these are American characters so at very least...but everyone sounds British (ok so Steven (Stephen?) you gave a US voice, but it wasn't very convincing). So, on one hand, totally lame. American accents are easy. But, on the other hand, if it's one or other, I choose Brit v. American accent 8 times out of 10. I hope that helps.

Any additional comments?

I think part of what I like about this series is the potential. Theoretically there are 11 more opportunities for the author to build up a nice over-arching plot while getting some nice lurve stories at the same time. Hope she keeps it up!

Two books in and I hope it gets better

Two books into the series and I’m seeing a pattern-H and h meet, H rescues h, they have sex (mate), then move onto the next book and couple. That’s it, no build up! For a romance book, it is seriously lacking. The story and characters are still building, but I would like to see more relationship building between couples. There is literally none. I hope it gets better as the series continues. As for the overall world building, it’s pretty good. It’s a new spin on supernatural creatures and their world. There are a lot of characters to keep up with and previous events and couples mentioned that led me to look up other books from this author. From what I can tell there are two other series before this one that probably should be read first to help better understand what is going on and who all the characters are. Unfortunately I didn’t know this and there is no mention of it in the blurb. So I’m going to keep moving on through this series and maybe go back and read the others. I’ll see how this one turns out first.
The narrator is okay but over lengthens pauses between sentences and commas, so the reading doesn’t flow very well. I changed the speech settings to go faster and this helped a little but doesn’t fix the problem. His voice is nice but he needs to work on accents. Sometimes it’s hard to tell who is talking but that’s probably due to how many different characters there are. I think using at least two different narrators would help out with this problem. Overall it’s not too bad to listen to. I’ve definitely heard worse narrators.

Terrific listen

Got confused at one point, as sometimes I was unsure which realm they were in, but it sorted itself out eventually.

But it's a great series! Id recommend this to lots of my friends.

very good book

very slow at first but, once it picks up its amazing!!! i love the love stories ❤

A WELL DESERVED 5 STAR RATING FOR A WORTHY LISTEN

Firstly, any words that I am about to use in my review, quite frankly, won't be enough to express just how brilliant, awesome and mind blowingly (ok I know Spellcheck told me it's not a real word) fantastic book this was.

HKW's gifted mind creates for us a parallel supernatural world, fills it with interesting, amusing and some hot paranormal characters that are all brought to life by the delicious voices of AF and together the talented pair draw you into a multi layered plot that's filled with intrigue, romance, twists and turns with so many sub plots, some of which hint at an ultimate climatic battle between an evil entity and the handsome 13 Alpha Kings together with their (all hopefully found) soul mates and partners - the lucky lucky Queens (could be funny but no, they are all, presumably, of the female variety).

This book was an action packed, thrilling listen that was riveting and pulled you right in to the fast paced love story as Thane finds his Queen (Siobhan) but fate denies him the time to properly woo her and explain his paranormal life as she's thrown straight into his magical world containing Demons, Witches, Warlocks, Vampires, Phantoms and all sorts of supernaturals which leaves her confused, breathless, dumbstruck but...... ultimately happy with Thane (sensible girl). There is a lot of mutual 'tingling' attraction going on but the sex scene wasn't very graphic and it didn't need to be as it was emotionally intense.

Worth a credit? Well it's left me bereft - putting the feeling into words - it's like you're starving, so you order your favorite pizza, it's delivered, you open the box mmmmm delicious..... but you're only given ONE more slice - yes, it was a mind-blowing, mouthwateringly, delicious taste but you needed MORE and NOW!!! Luckily I don't have to wait long .... just 9 days (and counting) until the next King audiobook is released and I get to taste my next slice of Heaven which I've already pre-ordered. So, back to 'worth the credit?' well do you really think I'm going to say no after this review and I'm anticipating spending many many more until I reach the ultimate WOW factor and get the WHOLE pizza!!

Great supernatural romance series

If your a fan of supernatural romance this is a great series to listen to - vampires, warlicks, werewolves, witches, fae and the list goes on. excellent story lines and strong character development. Even better, makes a point of having flawed, yet strong and amazing female characters

3.5 Stars

Mixed emotions. I found the story intriguing enough to continue reading, but I did not feel emotionally attached to the characters. I also felt that there were moments that were completely confusing, although this is book 2 of the King Series, I felt that there was missing information. This could be a personal flaw, as I have not read any other series by Heather Killough-Walden, but I would hope that the series would be able to stand on it's own without the knowledge of any other series. I just found that we are barely scratching the surface, and I wish there was more depth to the Kings existence and such. I am intrigued enough to continue the series and find out what is going to happen next.

Phantom King gets his Queen

This particular story wasn’t as good as book one but it was an integral part of the over arcing story which is filed out in pieces so far in book 1&2. It’s obvious there is a big BAD pulling strings somewhere and that keeps the plot moving and interesting. although the two protagonists spend the entire book circling each other with attraction, it doesn’t get to much of a crazy can’t live w/out you vibe, the sexy scenes are not many.
The female is a warlock and the male is the phantom king. After the guy she was dating is killed he shows up in oergatory where the phantom king rules, and does something the phantom king is floored by. Traveling to mortal realm to find him is where the king meets her. There is a lot of action and interaction between the thirteen kings, and a couple new characters that are very intriguing. It’s not a boring listen, it moves along pretty well, but my understanding is each of these books are overlapping the big picture, of you will, so u r left wanting to download the next, which I’m doing right now lol
Love Love that all of the books are part of romance package! ❌⭕️

Not as great as the first book. But still good.

This book was good. Not as good as the first one IMO. I do like all the characters and realms, the story is interesting and keeps your attention. I do miss dialogue, there is not much dialogue in these books, but the story is good. The sex is mild, and there was only one sex scene.

This series seems to be a continuation of each book. They cannot be stand alone books at all. You must read from the beginning of this series, The Vampire King, and in order or you will be lost.

I do feel like there was a bit of "filler" in this book. I particularly didn't like that we got Siobhan thoughts at her first meeting with Thanatos and then his thoughts it was about 2 chapters of repeat. Literally a repeat. I also thought the motorcycle race in purgatory was to long and unnecessary.

Other than that it was a good book. I will read the next in the series because the characters are quite fascinating.

Narrator did a good job. He is no Robert Petkoff but he did a good job.
Credit Worthy? Yes I think so.