Shapeshifted by Cassie Alexander

 

Nurse Edie Spence is once again called upon to save a life...and this time, it's personal. Can her new community of zombies, vampires, and shapeshifters come to her rescue when she needs them most?

When Edie was fired from her paranormal nursing job at County Hospital, her whole world came crashing down. Now she is once again shaken to her core. Her mother is deathly ill and there’s only one thing that will save her: vampire blood. But with the paranormal community shunning Edie, where can she find it…without losing her own life in the process?

Edie hopes to procure it at her new job at the clinic across town, where the forces of evil loom large. Vampire gang wars are rampant. Old underground enemies are rising to the surface. And Eide’s zombie ex-boyfriend has arrived at the scene—but is he the same man he used to be? And what should she make of the enigmatic doctor with whom she shares an unexpected connection? She’ll have to figure it out soon, because all hell is about to break loose—literally—and time is running out…

 

Shapeshifted (Edie Spence, book three) by Cassie Alexander

Start date: November 17, 2021

End date: November 19, 2021

Rating: 4 ½ out of 5 stars

Trigger warning: gang violence

Each novel gets better as the series progresses.

Shapeshifted picks up a little bit after Moonshifted left off. After Edie was shunned, she lost her job at County Hospital, meaning the protection that the Shadows gave to Jake, her brother, was gone. He’s back on drugs, and Edie is back to worrying if he’ll overdose and die in a ditch somewhere. She’s working overnights at a sleep clinic now. Not only would her previous job have no record of her working there (so Edie has a gap in her résumé), but none of her coworkers remember her either (so no current references). When Edie runs into her former coworker Gina in town, it becomes obvious the Shadows wiped her memory.

“You don’t remember me?”

She frowned deeply. “No. Should I?”

I blinked. Oh, no. I’d told the Shadows I didn’t want them to change my memories—maybe instead they’d changed everyone else’s?

“I’m sorry—I must have you confused with someone else,” I said. It wasn’t worth Gina wondering who the Shadows had stolen away from her for the rest of her day. I’d been the one to choose remembering. I didn’t think she would have chosen to forget. (Alexander 111)

One Poison Pie by Lynn Cahoon

What’s a kitchen witch to do when her almost-fiancé leaves her suddenly single and unemployed? For Mia Malone, the answer’s simple: move to her grandmother’s quirky Idaho hometown, where magic is an open secret and witches and warlocks are (mostly) welcome. With a new gourmet dinner delivery business—and a touch of magic in her recipes—Mia’s hopes are high. Even when her ex-little sister, Christina, arrives looking for a place to stay, Mia takes it in stride.

But her first catering job takes a distasteful turn when her client’s body is found, stabbed and stuffed under the head table. Mia’s shocked to learn that she’s a suspect—and even more so when she realizes she’s next on a killer’s list. With Christina, along with Mia’s meddling grandma, in the mix, she’ll have to find out which of the town’s eccentric residents has an appetite for murder…before this fresh start comes to a sticky end…

 

One Poison Pie (Kitchen Witch Mystery, book one) by Lynn Cahoon

Start date: October 30, 2021

End date: November 5, 2021

Rating: 3 stars out of 5

Trigger warning: extortion, sex trafficking

This book was scatterbrained at times. There is a lot jampacked into one novel that, even for the first book in a new series, seemed like too much at once. The plot was kind of a mess, jumping all over the place, and even at the end, I felt I had more unanswered questions than I would have liked.

Before the novel begins, Mia Malone buys an old schoolhouse in her grandmother’s hometown of Magic Springs to give herself a fresh start after her breakup. She left behind her cheating ex-boyfriend, Isaac Adams, and the catering company she helped him build. She intends on turning the new property into a catering business once the building is up to code. Living with her until she can get back on her feet is Christina Adams, Isaac’s younger sister and the screwup of the Adams family. Mia is suspicious of Christina’s presence fearing she may have ulterior motives, but she gives her a position in her catering company anyway.