Symphony of Blood features Hank Mondale, a down on his luck, gambling P.I. Hank is a stereotype wrapped around a stereotype. He never has any money, he's got collectors coming from every angle and he spends an inordinate amount of time ogling his extremely annoying and perky secretary. None of these are exactly new to the genre. The chauvinistic thing got old fast. It's not really funny, mostly it's annoying. In a genre mostly read by women it's also a little ridiculous.

So, Hank has finally gotten a case. A rich real estate mogul hires him to protect his spoiled rich girl daughter. A monster is trying to kill her. It just so happens Hank's cop friend is investigating a weird case of his own. The more Hank goes searching the more weird deaths he finds. Hank finally goes to his new employer demanding some answers as nearly all the deaths seem to circle around them. Suddenly rich spoiled girl is less terrified and more spoiled, annoying and crass than believable. Definitely no strong females in this book. Rather, more stereotypes.

Spoiled brat daughter reveals the monster's reasons for obssessing over her just in time for "Symphony" to attack. I expected the story to really pick up here, as the previous investigation kept things moving but it was slow. No such luck. Instead we review everyone Symphony has killed from the beginning, only from Symphony's point of view. Seeing as nothing new is revealed and mostly the descriptions of Symphony's method of killing are more gross than horror-worthy it became boring very quickly for me. If Symphony's point of view and Hank's point of view had overlapped rather than Symphony's POV just repeating what we already knew had happened it would have been interesting and kept things from stalling out. Once Symphony's POV catches us up again we have our hero and our heroine(???) fleeing. Cue stupid rich girl trying to seduce our much older hero. Stereotype. Gross. An old used one that only worked in the 50's or 60's genre and is now just demeaning.

The end resolution is ridiculous. All in all the author has a good voice but the rhythm was thrown off halfway through and I didn't find a single character interesting except Symphony. The good news is Symphony is really very interesting and a sympathetic character. Unfortunately as I said by the time we see Symphony's POV it's only a re-hashing of what's already happened. ( )

I got this book to read and review from Paranormal Romance & Urban Fantasy Fanatics! I liked Sandy, as soon as I started the book. She was a quirky character. We moved on to the scene where Mackenzie told Hank that the monster was coming for her and I thought..Oooh is this book going to be good! I was disappointed. Even though Hank annoyed me, I stuck with the book thinking its okay even if I don't like the lead character. Then came the monster's point of view. Not only was it unnecessary but it bored me no end as well. But I have to say that I loved the description of the monster's change-it was icky and gross, just as it should have been. The ending was another let down. ( )

The story just doesn't make sense. The characters were not well conceptualize especially Symphony. The characters all are crazy and the plot was just all over the place. I especially did not like the chapter where Symphony is narrating. Gross. ( )

An e copy of this book was received from the author via Goodreads.
Okay, the best thing that I can say about this book, is that it is only 162 pages long. I was grateful when I got to the end.

The protagonist is Hank Mondale and is a private investigator, with a huge gambling addiction and a small liquor problem. Sounds familiar doesn't it? There is nothing original about this character or in the least bit likeable. He is constantly short of money and attempts to gamble his way out of his debt and of course incurs even more debt. He desperately wanted to be cop but could not become one because of past legal issues. I know that the reader was meant to be sympathetic to Hank but a drunk gambler, who cannot keep his shit together was not appealing. Hanks problems were of his own making. As a straight, cisgendered, able bodied White man, he should have had the world at his beck and call, whereas; the servile people of colour in this story were up against systemic inequalities. Even in the end when legal issues should have been an issue for Hank, he was given a pass. The police had no regard for a dead prostitute, but a White man who can barely stay sober received tons of concern.
When Hank is contacted by Blake, a business tycoon to deal with an entity that is stalking is privileged daughter Mackenzie, Hank sees this as a dream come true. With the promise of money, he begins investigating. There are several murders and slowly we learn that this deaths are all connected.

When Hank learns that all of the deaths are due to a monster, he naturally disbelieves what he is being told. It is only after seeing the creature for himself, that he realizes that the Blakes were telling the truth. What he does not realizes is that though the Blakes are on the run from the creature, that they are equally culpable for the deaths themselves.


Suddenly we have a shift in the story and the point of view switches to that of the monster. The problem with this is that we then spend a good chunk of time reviewing what we have already learned. The monster tells us about the people that it killed; however, it all felt like filler because we already know that it killed these people. I suppose this was an attempt to explain the monsters motivation and once create sympathy but the shift erased the little momentum that the story had.

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The book took me a long time to read. The idea for the plot was quite interesting and the characters not too unbelievable, but the result was not engaging enough for me. The main hero is, to be honest, a bit dull and cliche. All in all, an average book. ( )