Book of Shadows (a thriller) [Kindle Edition]

I'll admit--I haven't read a mystery in ages--and as I was gazing at my bookshelf Tuesday night desperately trying to find something quick to read--I stumbled across this book that I received as an ARC many moons ago at a public library convention. I read the back cover and thought...Witches? Grimoires? Murder?...that isn't my usual fare, but I wanted to try something different, so I grabbed it off the shelf and took it to the gym with me where I devoured the first 100 pages in an hour on the treadmill. I figure if I have to slave away at burning calories, I might as well enjoy myself. But I digress....
Book of Shadows puts detective Adam Garrett against the forces of evil, conjured up by a novice witch who unknowingly releases a power much greater than himself known as Choronzon. Garrett and his partner, Landauer, are investigating the murder of an upper class college student, Erin Carmody, when they discover satanic carvings and evidence of ritualistic crime associated with Satanism and Witchcraft. Although the two quickly have a suspect in custody, a local witch and psychic who is convinced the police have the wrong character enters the picture. Tanith is mysterious, sexy, and holds a number of answers to the information the detectives are seeking. The plot moves along quickly as another young woman goes missing and the detectives race against the clock (and Chorozon) to save her....or find her remains.
I found this book entertaining and fun to read. It was like biting into a great piece of cake that you want to savour for a long time and enjoy its sweetness. But it is cake--and that's ultimately what I took from it. A fun way to spend an afternoon and a bit of a guilty pleasure.
The sex scenes played out like a steamy (and raunchy) novel and were quite full of cliche's...and the ending was a bit cheesy for my taste as well and somewhat hard to believe. But all in all, I had fun with this one, and that's what it's ultimately about, right???

Book of Shadows by Alexandra Sokoloff

A brutal murder becomes a paranormal nightmare for a pair of Boston homicide detectives. Adam Garrett finds himself unwilling to believe and yet unwilling to turn away from "wicked" help is solving some horrific murders.

Adam is a solid skeptic who struggles with inexplicable behavior. Garrett's internal strife between his burning ambition and his overwhelming need to serve justice provides a lot of the tension in this book. A high profile murder with an easy solution seems like an ideal situation to feed his ambition and sate his "perfect" girlfriends need for a status successful mate.

Landauer's gruff concern for Garrett's well being and his stalwart loyalty were laudable emotions aptly illustrated by the author. She did a great job at creating believable characters and seemingly rational explanations for irrational behaviors.

I've never been a fan of satanic evil fare but this book combines a solid mystery and main stream acceptable protagonists with the, oh too popular, paranormal strife in a highly readable format. I liked it.
I recommend the book.

I totally should have loved this book. I mean, it's a mystery and I love mysteries. In fact, there's only one thing I love more than I love mysteries and that's everything and anything to do with witches. I'm serious. This all started with my anything but brief obsession with Charmed when I was 11 years old (and Charmed was in its first season). Ever since then I have been drawn to books about witches (whether it be fiction or non-fiction) and books about the occult. I just think that it's a fascinating subject. Book of Shadows was a mystery with a paranormal aspect to it. Lots of magic, lots of witches, and lots of suspense. Plus, I've read three of Alexandra Sokoloff's books; two I really loved and one that I thought was just okay. So, this book had "ME!" written all over it. Yet, I didn't really love it like I expected to.

Book of Shadows reminded me a bit of The Unseen in that it started a bit slow. It took about an hour to get through the first twenty pages because I kept falling asleep (although that could've been because I was just really, really, tired). It got better after that and I was intrigued 200 pages and then the book started dragging a bit again. It was just a bit repetitive, especially that whole thing with Garrett and Tanith. Garrett is stumped by something. He goes to Tanith for help. She explains the situation to him. He's skeptical and doesn't believe. He concludes that she's crazy. Now this is all fine and dandy...the first time. But then Garrett keeps going to Tanith for help and then keeps concluding she's crazy when she explains the unexplainable to him. This happened like three or four times. And that led me to conclude that Garrett...yeah he's a bit of an idiot...and annoying.

Besides the slogging and the idiocy of the main character, I did like Book of Shadows overall. It's pretty obvious that Sokoloff was meticulous in her research of the occult. Again that's a subject that has always fascinated me so my favorite parts were when Tanith (who oddly enough reminded me of Paige from Charmed with the whole dark hair, dark eyes, but pale as hell complexion thing that was described of Tanith) was describing the whole thing with the demon and what the triangle meant. I love crap like that.

So overall I think that Book of Shadows was an okay read. It wasn't my favorite book from this author (The Price was), but it wasn't my least favorite either. I think that the subject was great, but the execution was a bit less than stellar.

P.S. Kick-ass cover!