The Book of Cold Cases

A major priority of mine during this fun period of “Free Reading” as I’ll call it is working through the titles I’ve collected over the past 2-3 years that I wanted to read but simply never had the time to, or frankly the interest, in many cases. A lot of those are YA and adult genre books—romances, murder mysteries, domestic thrillers, etc.

I used to LOVE reading my Book of the Month Club books, but I’ve gone on-and-off of it erratically over the past three years due to my insane TBR piles, but now I have a little time to make it through books that were/would have been/read like BOTM picks, and I started off with something spooky for the end of October/early November: The Book of Cold Cases by Simone St. James. She’s good for a spooky mystery with a little haunting and unreliable characters, and this one did not disappoint, but it also didn’t really stand out to me.

Our protagonist, Shea, is a 29 year old divorcee who runs a true crime blog while working as a receptionist at a medical office, and also dealing with the lasting trauma of being abducted, and surviving, as a child. Her primary story line takes place in 2017—no pandemic in site, in Claire Lake, Oregon. The most well-known story in Claire Lake is that of the “Lady Killer” a series of two shootings of men that seemingly was done by a woman, because of the notes, etc. Rich resident, and orphan, Beth Greer, was arrested and tried for the crimes, but was acquitted, and has lived a half live in the family’s historic, ugly mansion ever since. A chance encounter at the doctor’s office leads to Shea taking a chance, asking Beth if she can interview her about the case, and getting in over her head. Beth’s an enigma who probably didn’t do it…but why is she acting so weird? What the hell is going on with this house? In flashbacks to 1977 (and further back) we unfold Beth’s experiences on trail, and what really happened, and while it’s ultimately interesting, there’s a lot of just like “she did it to do it” that left me nonplussed.

St. James’ writing style is very quick-paced, I love the dual POVs and the different timelines that allow us to see the past rather than hear it recounted in narrative dialogue but I do think her use of the supernatural is one of the weakest parts of this book. Is the house haunted? Okay great….but how does that really manifest and why is she a ghost and what are we expected to do about it next? Shea being a victim herself makes the story move differently, but I kept feeling like another shoe was going to drop there…and it didn’t. Ultimately, I found the Beth ending just kind of boring, and I wanted more suspense by the end of it, rather than a narrative diatribe of the perils of treating children poorly.

Overall, it was a 3.5 star read for me, and I’ll probably pick up whatever St. James does next, but will definitely recommend Sundown Motel over this one.