Book Review: The Shadow Girls by Alice Blanchard (#4 Natalie Lockhart)

Rating:⭐⭐⭐

The Shadow Girls by Alice Blanchard is the fourth novel in the author’s Natalie Lockhart series, a fact of which I was unaware when I downloaded this book.

The novel begins with the discovery of the body of sixty-four-year-old Randolph Holmes in a warehouse where he is employed. Though his employer praises his work ethic the deceased’s female colleagues were wary of him. Detective Natalie Lockhart leaves the side of her comatose senior officer/friend, who was attacked by one of their colleagues who is now absconding, to attend to the case. Her investigation reveals a sinister side to the deceased and links to other crimes being investigated. The narrative follows Natalie as she investigates several cases which seem to be connected including one involving the disappearance of her best friend more than a decade ago while navigating her personal life and relationship issues.

I loved the premise and the setting of a town known for its “witchy" history, covens and Wiccans and thought the procedural aspect was really well executed, though I thought the drama in the protagonist’s personal life (the romance tracks) messed with the pace of the novel and distracted from the mystery angle. Usually, I don’t have problems picking up a series midway if the story is well-rounded. However, this book does not work as a standalone. There is a strong continuity with the preceding books and I felt that I was missing out on a lot of the backstory and important plot points since the resolution of several previous cases were related to the present one.

Many thanks to St. Martin’s Press and NetGalley for the digital review copy. All opinions expressed in this review are my own.