Bloodshot

December 6, 2010
Steampunk and gothic author Priest (Boneshaker) dives into urban fantasy with this entertaining conspiracy thriller. When blind vampire Ian Stott hires thief Raylene Pendle to steal medical documents that may help restore his sight, Raylene learns about Bloodshot, a government-sanctioned project that involved performing cruel experiments on vampires. With the proverbial men in black closing in on her, Raylene follows the Bloodshot document trail from Seattle to Atlanta, where she teams up with a deadly drag queen whose sister was one of the project's victims. Then she heads to Washington, D.C., to confront the people who have revived the Bloodshot project and want to make Raylene their next experiment. Raylene's breezy, first-person voice and quirky views on life add plenty of bite to the story, but the lack of a clear-cut resolution may grate on readers used to Priest's self-supporting steampunk novels.

Starred review from December 1, 2010

A 100-year-old vampire thief runs afoul of secret biological experimenters—first of an urban fantasy series from the versatile author of Boneshaker (2009).

Sassy vampire Raylene Pendle makes a good living by stealing things to order; luckily, the numerous law-enforcement agencies in pursuit think she's a man. Very much a loner, she lives in Seattle in a vast abandoned warehouse stuffed with valuable objects acquired as insurance—premises she shares with a pair of street-urchin intruders who, over the months, have gradually morphed into lodgers. When charming blind vampire Ian Stott asks for her help, money no object, Raylene pays close attention. Ian needs her to retrieve top secret government files—documents detailing the horrid black-op Army experiments, performed on vampires and other unorthodox persons, that left Ian blind. After an interloper invades her warehouse—Raylene kills him without compunction—she doesn't immediately make the connection. Then, in Atlanta, she gets a lead on another victim of the experiments via the victim's brother Adrian, a huge, ex–Navy SEAL drag queen. Unfortunately, there are immediate complications: ruthless Men in Black masquerading as CIA; and evidence that Project Bloodshot, supposedly shut down years ago, is once more roaring ahead thanks to a mysterious, mega-rich private financier. Brutally unsentimental narrator Raylene—she suffers from early-morning panic attacks and can't help wondering where Adrian tucks his male equipment while he's queening—makes a quirky and charming if bloodthirsty host.

A refreshing and addictive lure for readers uninterested in fangs, bats, capes and hissing.

(COPYRIGHT (2010) KIRKUS REVIEWS/NIELSEN BUSINESS MEDIA, INC. ALL RIGHTS RESERVED.)

January 1, 2011

In this urban fantasy, vampires and other preternatural creatures live secretly among humans. Kick-butt, undead heroine Raylene Pendle makes a relatively safe and very lucrative living as a cat burglar. Things change when another vampire, the handsome Ian, asks her to retrieve important, highly classified medical documents. He had been kidnapped by the military and rendered blind by their experiments. He escaped but needs the lab notes to regain his sight. The real adventure begins when Raylene takes on the case. Priest (Boneshaker) is a marvelous writer, but the intensity that usually captures her readers on the first page is missing here. Although the prose is clever and funny much of the time, neither the story nor the characters are original or compelling. VERDICT This is not Priest at her best; however, she has a strong fan base.--Patricia Altner, Columbia, MD

Copyright 2011 Library Journal, LLC Used with permission.

February 1, 2011
Locus Award winner (Boneshaker, 2009) Priest makes her first foray into urban fantasy with a new series starring undead flapper and high-class thief Raylene Pendle. Being a vampire just means quick healing and useful supernatural abilities as far as Raylene is concerned. She manages to stay out of vampire politics, living alone and working mostly for humans, until a blind vampire shows up and asks for her help in locating the records of the government experiments that left him permanently handicapped. Within moments of accepting the job, Ray is being tailed by government agents, and someone seems to be casing her warehouse, where she stashes goods she cant move and lets two homeless kids crash. Priest writes a fast-paced mix of caper novel and thriller that features realistically flawed characters (vampire and human). Plenty of action and a fairly high body count (mostly bad guys) make this a good suggestion for fans of Christopher Farnsworths Blood Oath (2010) and other crime readers who dont mind a few vampires.(Reprinted with permission of Booklist, copyright 2011, American Library Association.)