➸ I was gifted a copy of this book by the author in return for an honest review.
Sam Young, an up-and-coming defense attorney with psychic abilities, finds himself caught up in the investigation of a serial killer when a young nun named Camille Paradisi approaches him outside the courthouse one evening. Camille also shares journal entries that have been showing up piecemeal at the church that she believes could have been penned by the killer. The journal begins in the 1940’s, Argentina, and tells the life story of a person who claims to have mind control and to be the descendant of fallen angels cast out of heaven by God. Identifying the killer could put the pastor at the church at risk if they can’t find the murderer before he kills again.
When I was asked to read and review this book I was bit on the fence about it. Legal thrillers are not normally my jam but with the supernatural addition I thought it might be something I’d enjoy. To my welcome surprise I really, really liked this book. Our main character Sam is likable, funny, smart, and enterprising. As we follow Sam through the day to day of being a lawyer we are introduced to a multitude of diverse and interesting characters. At the time I thought that while interesting, meeting all these people seemed to be just filler and not actually necessary to the story. But I was quite wrong on that front. You don’t know it at the time but all the relationships Sam is cultivating with his clients become quite relevant later on in the book. I was actually impressed with the way the author brought the story full circle with details I didn’t even realize were important at the time. One of the major strengths of this novel is definitely the characters and being a character-driven reader this really appealed to me.
A couple other aspects I really liked about this story was the writing style and expertise. The author, Christopher Leibig, is a criminal defense lawyer with a postgraduate degree in forensics and it really shows. He was able to make this story more realistic and interesting with his intimate knowledge on the subject. He also wrote in a way that didn’t bore the reader to tears with all the forensic jargon. I quite liked the time spent in court and talking about evidence; two things I never really thought were capable of entertaining me on any real level. On another note, I find that most books I really like usually have some humor in them so it’ll be no surprise that I found our main character to be pretty funny in a dry way. I found myself smiling a lot during the dialogue bits.
So, what took off a star? In the beginning of the book when we are first being introduced to characters, I found that the authors way of describing women and overweight people to be insensitive and unattractive. When the nun, Camille, came into the picture the descriptions used to describe her were a bit too sexual for my taste especially given her life choice. He also emphasized her attractive and youthful appearance as if only old and unattractive women could be a nun. A short time later we meet an overweight woman who was described using words like “huge” and “colossal”. The main character did treat the women with empathy and caring but the insensitive way of describing them didn’t sit well with me and this may turn off some readers, especially those who consider themselves to be overweight. Looking back I really don’t think the author meant anything derogatory by the way these characters were written and hopefully his future books will be written with more sensitivity in that department.
That is really the only criticism I have for this book. I was pleasantly surprised by how much I enjoyed this and will be picking up the sequel, Almost Damned, very soon. I’m very curious to see where this story will go next. I recommend this to both legal thriller and fantasy fans. And if you’re like me who normally wouldn’t read something like this but are intrigued? Give it a go! You won’t be disappointed.
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