Strange Neighbors by Ashlyn chase

Back of the Book:

He's looking for peace, quiet, and a little romance... There's never a dull moment when hunky all-star pitcher and shapeshifter Jason Falco invests in an old Boston brownstone apartment building full of supernatural creatures. But when Merry MacKenzie moves into the ground floor apartment, the playboy pitcher decides he might just be done playing the field... A girl just wants to have fun... Sexy Jason seems like the perfect fling, but newly independent nurse Merry's not sure she's ready to trust him with her heart...especially when the tabloids start trumpeting his playboy lifestyle. Then pandemonium breaks loose and Merry and Jason will never get it together without a little help from the vampire who lives in the basement and the werewolf from upstairs...

About the Book:

This is a story of a young woman, finally leaving her family home to head out to the big city.  She leaves her family to live the life of "Sex and the City", but finds something even more important... the love of her life.  However, life is never easy and no matter how perfect something seems, there's always a secret that messes things up.  Can Merry handle all the secrets that she learns about?  Can Merry be trusted with all those secrets? There's only one way to find out.... read the book!

My Opinion:

Merry, the main female character is the only character without a paranormal ability.  There are shapeshifters, werewolves, witches and vampires... all of them living together (almost like that SpikeTV show "Mad House").  Oh, and a ghost that refuses to leave his apartment.  This makes for a lot of secrets and a lot of interesting things happening in this brownstone.

This is a pretty cute, quirky and fun little romantic novel.  It's very heavy with the paranormal beings and activities, maybe a little too heavy with them.  There are so many paranormal things going on, that it's a little distracting and hard to keep track of.   With all the paranormal things going on, it tends to make the story of each character a little disjointed, and the main plot of the book seems to get drowned out by it all.  The saving grace of the book is that you really enjoy each of the characters.  I enjoyed them enough that I wanted to know them better, which was a drawback of the book.  You just don't get to know each of them enough to really "sink your teeth" into them (pun intended, one of the characters IS a Vampire!).

Aside from the distractions of all the strange characters, it was a pretty fun book to read.  The sex scenes were good, although reading through this book I wasn't as interested in the sex scenes as I was the paranormal stuff.  I would have really liked to get to know the two witches better, and the vampire... but maybe their stories will be in another book.  That would be nice! (hint hint).  I gave it 3.5 stars because of how distracting all the characters were, and how their story lines were fleshed out enough for my taste.

Overall I would recommend this book to anyone who has fun reading about paranormal characters and activities with some romance thrown in.   Be prepared to get distracted by the side characters though, they are all very interesting, but you don't get enough of their stories to really get to know them.  This is a very easy and quick read, perfect for someone who needs something to read on a plane ride or long road trip when you're not the driver.

My rating: 3.5 stars

Product Details

• Author: Ashlyn Chase
• Publisher: Sourcebooks Casablanca (June 1, 2010)
• ISBN-10: 1402236611
• ISBN-13: 978-1402236617