Book Review: Shadows of Serenity by Marsha A. Moore

I received this book in exchange for an honest review through Lovers of Paranormal on Goodreads.

God, I had such high hopes for this book.  I loved the idea of combining yoga and paranormal stuff.  It was something that I hadn't heard of before and I was so into the idea.

It had a pretty cover too.  This really could have been a great book...however...

Shadows of Serenity is the story of a woman who opens a yoga studio in an old Victorian house. Joyce and her boyfriend, Eric, quickly realize that there is more to the house than meets the eye. Repairs aren't going as planned and there seems to be a mysterious ghostly presence in the house. Nothing is settling and everything in the air is tense. When the new yoga teaching students come in, it is their responsibility to help the restless spirit and liberate the house from the dark entity that hovers in the background.

This book starts with a simple yoga idea and expands it. It took basic principles and applied them to magical powers that are channeled through yogic practices. Joyce can talk to birds. Others can sense spirits or auras and others can take pain or anxiety away from someone else. While I get that a lot of this is based off of old teachings, I never found it compelling in any sense. It tap danced a line between a paranormal story and basically a manual/short story about a woman with a yoga studio.

Personally, I never connected to the characters. Their problems weren't real to me and it never felt like they had real personalities. I kept getting this impression that it would be a really great read for someone that was deeply involved in yoga but it didn't translate to the layman or casual yoga person. Everything was solved through yoga poses and deep breathing. Yes, people got hurt. Bad things happen. But I never believed that sending good energy at a psychopath would help anything.

Overall, this book lacked substance for me. The characters were weak and the writing read like an instruction booklet. I appreciate yoga, I really do. But I never believed enough in the strength enough to root for Joyce or anybody else and truly think that they could conquer the spirits in the house.

A good author should make me believe that these characters could do anything if they put their minds to it, but that never happened.

2 out of 5 stars.