The Bottom Line: A spellbinding small-town paranormal thriller where witchcraft and murder make deadly company.
Set in California’s Santa Cruz Mountains, Murder Under Redwood Moon is the story of a spiritually attuned young woman whose quiet routines begin to fracture. Twenty-three-year-old Arista Kelly spends her time practicing witchcraft when she’s not working in the Earth & Ocean crystal shop. Troubling visions of an ominous tattoo, mounting unrest at home and the murder of a former classmate force her into a world where intuition and survival suddenly matter as much as courage.
That danger becomes concrete when local sheriff Pete Michaels is called to the river after a young woman’s body is found. Michaels soon connects the new case to another woman, fearing the work of a serial killer. The mountain town lawman grounds the novel in procedural investigation. Meanwhile, are the forces pressing on Arista criminal, supernatural or both?
Author Sherri L. Dodd has created a highly atmospheric world that feels both familiar and spiritual. The redwood forests, mountain roads, crystal shop, ghostly disturbances and intimate domestic spaces create a moody Northern California gothic that suits the story well. Dodd also knows how to demonstrate the ways in which menace can reach into communities before there’s much hard evidence. The town itself seems to be rife with suspicious characters, as women sense communal danger before they know all the answers. Bethie, Arista’s eccentric great-aunt and guardian, is one of the book’s most potent forces. Her humor, force of will and spiritual knowledge keep the book from becoming a standard police thriller. Her relationship with Arista supplies the story’s emotional center, while Sheriff Michaels provides a sturdy procedural counterweight. The result is a novel that lets ritual, intuition, and police work operate side by side rather than forcing one to cancel out the other.
The book also carries a romantic thread through Arista’s relationship with Shane, softening the harsher edges of the story without diluting its suspense. Their connection develops from friendship into overt love, giving Arista an emotional stake beyond mere survival. Fans of Leigh Bardugo may find a new favorite in Dodd.
