Blog Tour - A Study In Shifters {The Adventures of Marisol Holmes #1} By Majanka Verstraete {Review & Giveaway!}

Hello guys and welcome to the official Blog Tour for A Study In Shifters, a novel based off of Sherlock Holmes but, with a Paranormal Twist! Make sure to read my review at the end of this post and don't forget to enter the amazing Giveaway that follows!

Title: A Study In Shifters

{The Adventures of Marisol Holmes #1}

Author: Majanka Verstraete

Publication Date: June 26th, 2018

Genres: Young Adult, Paranormal

Seventeen-year-old Marisol Holmes may be the great-great-great granddaughter of Sherlock Holmes, but it’s hard to live up to the family name when only one mistake can spell your downfall. After trusting the wrong guy in a case gone totally wrong, Marisol convinces the Conclave, an underground organization of detectives solving supernatural cases, to give her a last chance to prove her worth, and maybe even heal her broken heart.

After all, as a half-blood jaguar shifter, Marisol is uniquely qualified to solve this murder—and every scrap of evidence points toward the culprit being a fellow jaguar shifter. But is one of her own people involved, or is this all a ploy to kick Marisol’s mother off the shifter throne?

Then Marisol discovers her best friend, Roan, is missing, and maybe the killer’s next target. The stakes just got higher than political intrigue. Just when things couldn’t get worse, Marisol’s ex-boyfriend-turned-nemesis, Mannix, starts leaving sinister clues for her. Marisol fears this case might be far more personal than she could’ve imagined. 

It’s time for Marisol to prove her worth, or her people could fall into chaos while her best friend loses his life.

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*I received this book for free in exchange for an honest review. All thoughts and opinions are my own!*

I'm a huge fan of Sherlock Holmes and was basically ecstatic when I discovered A Study In Shifters! It gave such an amazing and original spin to the classic because it incorporated the Paranormal element of shifters, something that made it even more unique and different from other novels based off of the greatest detective in the world of Literature, which usually have a Historical Setting! 

Our story begins when Marisol, Sherlock's great-times-three-granddaughter, who's trying to live up to the family name and prove that the one mistake she made does not define her! After a case gone wrong because she made the mistake of trusting the wrong guy, she convinces the Conclave - an underground organization responsible for solving supernatural crimes - to give her a second chance. According to the evidence she finds, it looks like the killer she's trying to bring to justice is one of her own people, a jaguar shifter! The stakes get even higher though, when her best friend, Roan, goes missing and might be the killer's next target. The political intrigue surrounding the mystery of this supernatural crime takes a backseat to everything else that's being going on and things become even more sinister when her ex-boyfriend turned nemesis starts leaving clues for her. Everything becomes so much more personal for Marisol and she has to do everything in her power to proof her worth while saving her best friend and her entire Kingdom.

Let's start off with the characters! Marisol was such a breath of fresh air and her determination become quite evident from the very beginning of the novel. A descendant of the great Sherlock Holmes herself, she's trying to live up to his name and get to the bottom of things, which isn't the easiest thing to achieve when one mistake led to her downfall. Even though she's been through a lot, she's trying her hardest to do the right thing and become the person she was always meant to be! Being half human and half shifter, it's not that easy for her to prove herself and convince people that she's good at what she does, even if her mother is Royalty. She's used to being looked down upon and it becomes even worse when she's betrayed and thrust into a world of political intrigue. I really admired her dedication to discovering who the killer was and it made me respect her even more! Also, her development throughout the novel made her even more likable than she started out being and I really enjoyed being a witness to her adventures! 

Moving on to the pacing of the story, which was perfect for me since I enjoy fast paced novels that don't feel rushed or not that well thought out. I never felt like the story got too slow and something was happening to keep me riveted to it at all times, which is a very difficult thing to come by in books nowadays. The writing was great as well and the even though the character development - excluding Marisol's - did not prevail, it was definitely there. The world building was everything I'd hoped it'd be and the author did a good job at living up to a classic that's also a favorite of mine, even though it wasn't the best version of it it could've been. 

The only thing I didn't really enjoy in the novel was the relationships between the characters. It felt like things abruptly ended while they were trying to reach that climax the plot needed in order to become even more interesting. They were very realistic and the mystery incorporated in the story made everything that was happening even more vivid in my head but, the transitions between them weren't as smooth as I would've liked. There was also some repetition that could've been avoided because it ended up being a bit overwhelming at times but, overall, the murders that took place and how solving them was handled made me focus on what was important in the development of the plot. 

Overall, I really enjoyed A Study In Shifters and the fact that I haven't read anything like it before made the experience of reading it even more interesting for me! I feel like it targets a certain audience with the way it's written so, you have to be really invested in the story and willing to let some things go, in order to truly enjoy it.

Author Majanka Verstraete has written more than twenty unique works of fiction. A native of Belgium, Majanka’s novels explore the true nature of monsters: the good, the bad, and just about every species in between. Her young adult books include the acclaimed Mirrorland (YA Dark Fantasy) and Angel of Death (YA Paranormal) series of novels. At MHB, Majanka is currently developing a new YA shifter series with a fresh take on fierce female detectives called THE ADVENTURES OF MARISOL HOLMES.

When she’s not writing, Majanka is probably playing World of Warcraft or catching up with the dozens of TV series she’s addicted to.

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