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    Bloodshot
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    Bloodshot
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    Bloodshot
    Audiobook11 hours

    Bloodshot

    Written by Cherie Priest

    Narrated by Natalie Ross

    3.5/5

    ()

    Currently unavailable

    Currently unavailable

    About this audiobook

    Raylene Pendle (AKA Cheshire Red), a vampire and world-renowned thief, doesn't usually hang with her own kind. She's too busy stealing priceless art and rare jewels. But when the infuriatingly charming Ian Stott asks for help, Raylene finds him impossible to resist - even though Ian doesn't want precious artifacts. He wants her to retrieve missing government files: documents that deal with the secret biological experiments that left Ian blind. What Raylene doesn't bargain for is a case that takes her from the frozen outskirts of Minneapolis to the mean streets of Atlanta. And with a psychotic, power-hungry scientist on her trail, a kick-ass drag queen on her side, and Men in Black popping up at the most inconvenient moments, the case proves to be one hell of a ride.
    LanguageEnglish
    PublisherBrilliance Audio
    Release dateJan 25, 2011
    ISBN9781441890894
    Unavailable
    Bloodshot
    Author

    Cherie Priest

    Cherie Priest debuted to great acclaim with Four and Twenty Blackbirds, Wings to the Kingdom, and Not Flesh Nor Feathers, a trilogy of Southern Gothic ghost stories featuring heroine Eden Moore. She is also the author of Fathom, Dreadnought, and Boneshaker, which was nominated for a Nebula and Hugo Award and won the PNBA Award and the Locus Award for best science-fiction novel. She is an associate editor at Subterranean Press. Born in Tampa, Florida, Priest went to college at Southern Adventist University and earned her master’s in rhetoric at the University of Tennessee. After spending most of her life in the southern United States, she recently moved to Seattle, Washington, with her husband, Aric, and a fat black cat named Spain.

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    Reviews for Bloodshot

    3.5/5

    263 ratings41 reviews

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    • 4/5
      The premise: ganked from BN.com: Raylene Pendle (AKA Cheshire Red), a vampire and world-renowned thief, doesn’t usually hang with her own kind. She’s too busy stealing priceless art and rare jewels. But when the infuriatingly charming Ian Stott asks for help, Raylene finds him impossible to resist—even though Ian doesn’t want precious artifacts. He wants her to retrieve missing government files—documents that deal with the secret biological experiments that left Ian blind. What Raylene doesn’t bargain for is a case that takes her from the wilds of Minneapolis to the mean streets of Atlanta. And with a psychotic, power-hungry scientist on her trail, a kick-ass drag queen on her side, and Men in Black popping up at the most inconvenient moments, the case proves to be one hell of a ride.My Rating: Worth Reading, with Reservations: The good thing with Cherie Priest is that her writing is confident and she manages to suck the reader a story with ease. That being said, I balked at the narrative voice, which often came off as too crass, too vulgar, and too paranoid for my tastes. At times, all of this was funny, but it did lead me to the conclusion that if Raylene were a vampire of my generation, I'd be fine with her, but she isn't, so I'm not totally happy. I'm hoping later novels in this series define her a little better as a vampire who's been around for nearly a century. I know Priest has the ability to do such a thing, give characters the proper voices for their historical periods, and I'd like to have a sense of Raylene's age and experience when she's narrating, not this rapid fire of tougher-than-you, paranoid, grate on peoples' nerves voice. Again, at times I found it funny, and because this is Priest writing, I was willing to roll with the book and enjoy the mystery and the supporting cast. But I hope Raylene calms down a bit and acts her age. I want to believe in her, because I can let a lot slide if I believe in my narrator/heroine, but I'm not there yet.That said, it's a pretty solid read that is fun (at times funny) and fast paced. I definitely plan to get book two, because hey, it's Cherie Priest. However, I'm still partial to her Eden Moore trilogy, starting with Four and Twenty Blackbirds. Go figure: I miss the stories that take place in my state! :) Review style: what I liked and what I didn't, with a rant about the differences between urban fantasy and paranormal romance and what readers should expect and why. The full review is at my LJ, and it does contain spoilers. As always, comments and discussion are most welcome.REVIEW: Cherie Priest's BLOODSHOTHappy Reading!
    • 4/5
      Bloodshot might not be particularly deep, but it’s just the sort of fun beach read I was looking for. Raylene, our anti-heroic protagonist, is a neurotic vampire thief. Another vampire, Ian Scott, hires her to retrieve some documents for him after the US army experimented on him and took his sight. What follows is a whirlwind hunt across the United States as Raylene discovers more and more about this government conspiracy.This wasn’t my first time reading Bloodshot, but after a couple of DNFs I was looking for something more reliable. Luckily, I had ebook copies of both Bloodshot and its sequel on hand. The last time I read the book was sophomore year of high school. This time around, there were a few things I noticed more than previously.Firstly, Raylene is definitely an anti-heroine. If I had to give her a Dungeons and Dragons style alignment, I’d put her at chaotic neutral. She’s a vampire who doesn’t have much compunctions about killing people, and she’s a thief who doesn’t care at all about the rules of law. She actually reminds me some of Cas from S.L. Huang’s Zero Sum Game. While Raylene stays within anti-heroine territory for the entirety of the book, she does become less of a loner as the course of the book (and the series) develops. She also has a casual, snarky voice that makes her an enjoyable narrator.I mentioned in the opening paragraph that Raylene’s neurotic. She also says that she might have a form of OCD. However, in both these cases I felt like this information was being told instead of shown. For instance, she says a number of times that she feels like she is about to have a panic attack, but there’s not description of what that actually feels like, and she never actually has one.Something I also noticed more this time around is that other than Raylene, there’s only one other reoccurring female character. And this character’s an eight year old girl without much plot impact. Since I’ve read the sequel, I’ll note that it does introduce a couple more female characters.While Bloodshot might not be an especially great book, it is fun and entertaining. Bloodshot contains: a female vampire protagonist, government conspiracies, men in black, and a badass Cuban drag queen. I don’t know if I’ll reread it again in the future, but I was glad that I came back to it this time.Originally posted on The Illustrated Page.
    • 3/5
      Delightful. The whole thing took a while to grow on me, but I really enjoyed the gender stuff and the narrator's sass. She's fun and crazy in the head without being unable to function, Adrian and Sister Rose are The Absolute Best, and the kids are great. Not crazy about the guy she ended up kissing, but I can roll with it. I'd definitely like to read the next one.
    • 4/5
      Raylene is a century-old vampire with some paranoid/OCD tendencies. She survives by being a very good thief. One day, she takes on a vampire client who wants more information on the procedures to which he was subjected when he was captured by the government. The search takes her to some dangerous places, and also gets her entangled with a buff ex-military drag queen. I had fun, though Raylene assumes she should use the pronoun that tracks that character’s current visual presentation at any given time, but doesn’t ask, and I wish she had.
    • 4/5
      Cherie Priest rarely does wrong, which is even more impressive when you consider that she switches genres every time she switches series. Bloodshot is straight up paranormal fantasy, but it's also better written and far more fun that most of the paranormal fantasy I've read thus far. Bloodshot actually reminded me a bit of a television show from the USA network - between the colorful characters and the overall plot punctuated by in-between cases (the synopsis of book #2, Hellbent, is confirming my suspicions about this), it feels like it would fit right at home with Burn Notice and White Collar.
    • 2/5
      Any vampire story where the vampire MC kills people gets low ratings from me, which is too bad because the narration and the rest of the story are very good.
    • 4/5
      Nice story. Love the narrators inner dialogue humor it was my favorite part. I like the vamp detective mash up. Wish it would have finished with her getting the last bad guy. Overall A great read. Definitely recommend
    • 3/5
      Bloodshot is an urban fantasy novel. It was a quick read and great as a beach book.
    • 3/5
      One of the best opening lines of a book! Fun story!
    • 4/5
      I didn't expect to love this. I wasn't a gigantic fan of Boneshaker, after all -- though come to think of it, I did appreciate Cherie Priest's choice of characters, and that's also a factor in my enjoyment of this. Basically, if the following sentence sells it to you, you'll see what I mean. Kickass ex-navy SEAL drag queen who is hot both in and out of drag, capable no matter what situation he's in, devoted to (the memory of?) his sister, can keep up with a century old vampire's super strength and senses and work well as a team with her.This is not YA. Which is good, because it gives me hope that Raylene (ostensibly the main character) will get together with Adrian (the navy SEAL drag queen). After all, she thinks he's smoking hot, and they have silly grins when they see each other. I quote, "dorky delight". Heck, I'm almost willing to enter the fray of shippers here, if there are any for this book. I liked Ian okay to start with, and I wouldn't object to joining Team Threesome for this book, but Adrian is the character I fell in love with.I'm not even so sure about the rest of the book -- Raylene's name doesn't feel right, her narration is all over the place in a way that doesn't feel natural a lot of the time, and there's probably plot holes. But I don't care, I'm in for this ride: get me a copy of Hellbent stat, and let's hope Raylene, Ian, Adrian and the kids end up as one big happy dysfunctional family.Forgot to add -- Raylene is not a harmless vampire. She will rip your throat out if you cross her. You might not even particularly deserve it. I actually appreciated that. She's not human in some ways, and you know it. I don't understand people who want the same book over and over, with plot-irrelevant sex-scenes.
    • 4/5
      Raylene steals things for a living. And she is also a vampire. Not the sparkly kind nor the really scary kind, just a human kind with un-deadness. Its an nice relief from all the other vampire types out there. Which is to say, Raylene is powerful, but not too powerful. She is also is very human, which is a welcome change from most urban fantasy novels with vampires.Raylene is powerful, but paranoid and alone. Its a typical set up for most heroines of this sort of story. As far as the story goes - its fairly typical of the genre. A mad scientist, interesting characters and a well written plot make this book stand out in a genre of repetition.
    • 4/5
      Summary: Raylene Pendle is a famous thief who also happens to be a vampire. She's not the sort for friends - letting anyone too close is a good way to be uncovered as being both a criminal and non-human. So when she's approached for a potential job - at her unlisted home address - she's understandably a little wary. Her client is Ian Stott, another vampire. That's unusual enough, but Ian's case has a wrinkle that really grabs Raylene's attention: Ian is the victim of a group that's conducting experiments on vampires, and he wants Raylene to steal the documents relating to the secret project that left him blind. She's intrigued - and outraged - enough that she's willing to help, but going up against the Men in Black may prove too much for even Raylene's formidable skills.Review: This book was fun to read, and I didn't have any major problems, but in the final analysis, urban paranormal mystery/thriller just isn't a genre that's my favorite, or even one in which I'm particularly interested. I suppose I knew that going in; detective thrillers are usually not my favorites to begin with (and even though Raylene is a thief, she's acting enough like a detective in this case to count). It turns out that making the protagonist a vampire didn't really help a lot - her vampirism takes a back seat for most of the book, usually only making her faster and stronger in a fight. So the meat of the book really is straight-up thriller: people getting into fights and shooting at each other and chasing each other and things getting blown up, etc. So that was fun, Priest keeps things moving quickly and with plenty of action, so I was certainly entertained throughout.Priest also does a nice job with the characters. Raylene's voice is clear and distinctive, and done without relying on gimmicks or tics or catch phrases that so often substituted for real character development. I particularly liked her interactions with the two street kids she's allowing to squat in her warehouse of stolen goods, and I thought the character of Adrian, the ex-military drag queen who winds up becoming Raylene's sidekick, was done really thoughtfully.I didn't think the mystery aspect was as well developed as it could have been. There were elements I didn't guess ahead of time, so I guess that's in the book's favor, but I was hoping for something more complicated and interesting than "shadowy government conspiracy", but that's all there was. This may be because there is at least one sequel to the book, so more of the secrets behind Project Bloodshoot may be yet to be revealed, but for this book as a standalone, I didn't find the resolution entirely satisfying. I also don't think I'm particularly likely to pick up the sequel. Again, this is a fine book, well-written, funny, lots of good action and good characterization, and I was certainly entertained the whole way through. But it's just not a genre on which I'm particularly interested in spending much of my time, even if there are vampires involved. 4 out of 5 stars.Recommendation: If you like urban fantasy or mystery thrillers, this is (as far as I can tell) a fun and well-written addition to the field. If you're reading it mostly for the vampires, though, it's probably not going to entirely satisfy.
    • 4/5
      Raylene is a thief who happens to be a vampire, and that's just the beginning of the unusual cast that peoples Bloodshot. Add in two runaways who live in her building (one obnoxious, one adorable), one blind vampire client, and one ex-Marine drag queen, and there's most of them.This is one of my favorite urban fantasy series, up there with those by Seanan McGuire and Tanya Huff. Priest is a great author and weaves a thoroughly enjoyable story around this odd cast.
    • 3/5
      The first-person narrative is well suited to this novel. The strong willed smart talking vampire thief read almost like a mystery novel with dashes of thriller thrown in. The most exciting part of the story without giving away any spoilers was just after she received the call about the PDF and what it drove her to do. The weakest part of the story was when she confronted the intruder in her warehouse, I thought she should have been much tougher and less vulnerable then she appeared to be.

      There is a second book in the series and I’ll be checking it out, this being one of the most enjoyable urban fantasies that I’ve read. I recommend this book to fans of Kim Harrisons Hollows series, although I enjoy the Hollows series more.
    • 5/5
      Cheshire Red is a vampire and an acquisitions expert (thief). Raylene likes that many people assume Cheshire Red is a man and she’s not about to dissuade them, enjoying working in the shadows as she does. Ian, another vampire who is oddly blind, has hired her to track down his medical records from his enforced stay at a secret government complex. Yet before she can dig into this case, things start to unravel in her cushy little life in Seattle – someone breaks into her warehouse and someone else blows her well laid cover. She drops it all to follow a thin lead in Atlanta. As Raylene continues to snoop into Ian’s affairs, things get more and more risky. Before you know it, her best defense is a military-trained drag queen and her best offense is one seriously ticked off blind vampire.This book was a lot of fun. Raylene definitely has a fluid sense of morals with few hard sticking points. She takes pleasure in her work – removing the priceless and rare from the rich and pretentious. She’s used Seattle as the base for her operations for a few decades now; hence, the warehouse where she stores (or hoards) some of her collection as a financial safety net. There’s also two homeless kids, Pepper and Domino, who she lets live there. She doesn’t really like kids but for some reason keeps the heat and electricity on in one section of the building for them. Oh, and makes sure they have a cell phone to call her. And she checks in on them regularly. Perhaps she brings them food. Not that they’re pets or anything. As you can see, Raylene has this tough exterior and this gooey caramel soft center. I really liked all the snark and Ray’s enjoyment of her own sexuality and being a vampire. I also like that she’s prone to panic attacks and that her powers don’t make her invincible – just really hard to kill.Ian is a bit of a quandary. It’s very unusual for a vampire to have any debilitating injury that becomes permanent. So Ian’s loss of sight is disturbing. If it can be done to one vampire, it can be done to another. He also uses a ghoul, Cal, which Raylene doesn’t like. However as she gets to know the two of them a bit more, she starts to reconsider her views on ghouls. Cal obviously still has a mind of his own and Ian treats Cal with respect and it’s obvious he needs some amount of help being blind. Still, there are plenty of unanswered questions surrounding Ian and he is indeed very reluctant to elaborate on what little he has already told her.Then we toss in a military-grade highly driven mad scientist and a large number or highly-trained military ‘acquisition experts’ that want Raylene and perhaps even want Ian back and everyone has to scatter to the four winds. Raylene ends up in Atlanta chasing down a lead. This is where my second favorite character, Adrian (aka Sister Rose), comes into the picture. Sister Rose is a drag queen and great at her nightly performances. Adrian is ex-military and has some specialty training. He initially becomes Raylene’s unwilling ally. Adrian was great with all the glitz and fringe and yet muscle and sensible behavior. I like that we never find out whether he’s straight, gay, or bi, or celibate. Raylene is too polite to ask.There’s plenty of action and interesting characters in this urban fantasy. The ending was solid. We lose a little and gain a little and have a ton of questions for Book 2. Ian definitely has some some things to follow up on. I’m hoping Adrian will continue to be a part of the series. While Raylene and crew took out several of the questionable military bad guys, I’m sure we haven’t seen the last of them.Narration: Natalie Ross did an awesome job with this book. All the characters are distinct and her male characters are great. She does this remarkable thing with Adrian’s two personas (Adrian versus Sister Rose). There’s also various accents that she does well. It’s just a very, very good performance.
    • 3/5
      I think Cherie Priest said, “hey, this paranormal vampire action stuff is popular – I could write one of those!” (or two… or three.) And she did. And it is actually really quite good. Unlike, say, the ‘paranormal vampire action’ book I read last year by Chloe Neill, which was just NOT GOOD. As opposed to the one in that book, Priest’s vampire heroine is witty, clever, relatable and cool. I can’t help feeling that there’s some authorial wish-fulfillment going on there, but hey – it works for my wish-fulfilling tendencies too. I feel like this book was written very quickly – but it also reads very quickly. It’s not Priest’s best, deepest book – but it’s good fun. I’d highly recommend it to fans of the True Blood TV series (more so than the Harris books.)
      It’s action-packed, it’s got a mystery to solve, the Southern, flapper, investigator and professional thief, vampire Raylene is bad-ass and hip, and who won’t be won over by a sexy undercover ex-Navy SEAL turned drag queen?
    • 3/5
      A fun, if shallow read. I enjoyed Reylene's OCD self-identified craziness. I loved the drag queen side kick and I thoroughly enjoyed that the vampire love interests was a little broken and vulnerable—no alpha a-holes here.

      It was a little on the predictable side and the writing was nothing extraordinary (though perfectly readable). Basically, the book was a fun, fluffy vampire read.
    • 4/5
      I must admit, the blurb for Bloodshot didn’t do much for me, but I decided to give it a chance anyway and read the first few pages. Raylene’s narration pulled me in immediately. Although Raylene gets caught an awful lot for a supposedly world-class thief, I have to love a vampire who, instead of being all suave, suffers from panic attacks and paranoia. I also enjoyed the supporting characters, Ian, Domino (aka. “the little shit”), Pepper, and of course, ex-Navy SEAL/drag queen Adrian. Overall, some parts are a tad slow, but Bloodshot is just the kind of fun, light-hearted entertainment I was in the mood for.
    • 5/5
      Read and reviewed in 2010Cherie Priest has created a great new character and added a fresh new face to the Urban Fantasy genre with Bloodshot's Raylene Pendle/Cheshire Red. A vampire and a professional thief, Ray is very good at what she does, but she is also highly OCD and prone to panic and anxiety attacks, which makes her much more "real" and likable than many characters in Urban Fantasy that are just all tough with no faults. Ray also tends to collect around herself a rather eclectic and motley crew of characters - a pair of kids that squat in a warehouse that she owns (and stores her ill-gotten gains inside), a fellow vampire who has escaped from a sinister government group that did experiments on supernaturals - leaving him blind, and an ex-Navy SEAL who is also a kicking drag queen! With characters like these, you know the book is going to be great.The basic plot is that Ian - the blinded vampire - wants Ray to find and steal the medical documentation kept on him while he was under government control so that he can hopefully have some of the damage reversed. Unfortunately no sooner does Ray begin her research than Men in Black start showing up all over the place to try to run her down.This is a must-read for anyone who enjoys vampire novels, Urban Fantasy and/or paranormal thrillers. Don't miss it!!
    • 3/5
      vacation read #3. Good pool book.
    • 2/5
      2.5 stars

      Bloodshot
      I’m not sure how I feel about this book. The first half was so-so, the second half quite good. Much of it wasn’t predictable. There were elements that pushed the first half up and the second half down. And one overarching problem: The main character is basically a sociopath. For example, in the beginning she kills someone just because he breaks into her warehouse even though he was unarmed. She never regrets this or thinks it was unjustified.

      Yes there are changes later but I was never satisfied. Frankly, I think all of the characters were too comfortable with murder. None of the characters acted as a conscience. But the character is a vampire after all. There is no assumption vampires are evil, they just are and they kill people sometimes, more frequently when they’re younger. Apparently it’s not as big a deal if you kill homeless people. That’s basically okay. That’s pretty much enough to make me not want to read further.

      But I pushed through because it takes place in Seattle and it was obvious she actually lives in Seattle rather than visited it once. It was a pleasure to read that but still the beginning was a little boring.

      Then I hit a joke I consider mildly racist but I can be way too sensitive about things like this. You decide:

      “A different abbreviation, one I hadn’t thought to scan for: ‘J. Roe.’ A jole about a Japanese pop singer sprang to mind, but I was a good girl and didn’t say it out loud—even though there was no one to hear me.”
      Pg. 96


      Also, only a lesbian should use the word “dyke” and the main character isn’t a lesbian. But the book was definitely gay friendly, so I went with it. See my confusion?

      The second half was much better and introduced one of the best UF characters I’ve seen in awhile. Not amazing like Stacia Kane’s Terrible, but still very good. But the book was leading me towards one guy as a love interest, building him up as being hot and sexy and sweet and strong and beautiful. The other she mentioned only twice as being someone she cared about and only once as being attractive (near the end) and he was the one she chose! I felt betrayed.

      Something mildly picky: She says PDF (Portable Document Format) instead of PDF file (Adobe's preference) and she says “Adobe processed it.” Adobe is the company, not the product. It’s like saying “we waited while Microsoft imported the text file.” The product is Adobe Acrobat or Adobe Reader. Again, I'm overly picky because I worked there for nearly a decade.

      I’m mildly curious about what happens next but I am not sure if I can stomach the immorality.


    • 3/5
      I was so excited to have won this on First Reads, and overall, it was quite enjoyable. Ms. Priest does a little too much telling in the first couple of chapters, i.e. having the protagonist describe herself in detail, but once past that bump, when the story got going, it really got going.

      Vampires, ghouls, black ops, a drag queen Navy SEAL, a venal but somehow appealing museum employee, and lots of fast-paced action overall made this an exciting read. Taken individually, all of the plot elements and most of the characters in this book have appeared elsewhere, but all together they're a thrill ride. I will definitely keep an eye out for the next book!
    • 4/5
      Finally, a vampire book that refuses to take itself seriously. The ultra-casual narration makes otherwise tired tropes fresh, and the ex-Navy SEAL drag queen sidekick is, well, fabulous. I'm totally on board for the next one.
    • 4/5
      I’m always very cautious when I pick up an urban fantasy book. For two reasons: 1. I’m not a romance reader, so the moment I see a paranormal/urban fantasy with romance and unexplainable feelings stirring from the loins because there’s a character with bestial urges and dangerous animal/pheromone attractiveness, it makes me roll my eyes and go for the next book on the list. 2. Inter species fluid swapping makes me cringe. Enough about this I am going off subject...I am very pleased to say, this book has NONE of the things I was not looking for in this type of book. Actually, in fact, I was pleased with this book overall. I loved the writing style, and what grabbed me after a couple of chapters is Raylene herself. Raylene is a character so well written, and so filled with wit and charm you can’t help but like her. She’s got an attitude, and her insults are beyond hilarious not to mention, her narration of the story is what really keeps the plot going and interesting. I’m not sure who you would compare her to, as my experience reading in this genre is somewhat limited, but I’d have to say her wit and insults got me laughing out loud at times. Her snide side comments also provide for much of the comic humor that goes on throughout this book.That is not to say this book is in anyway a light hearted read. The real plot itself is dark and the overall setting and some of the characters are oily, seedy, and awful. So there is a balance between action and humor here that makes the reading certainly ‘feel’ light even though the subject isn’t close to that. What I thought was fun was Raylene seems to attract a small group of followers and she has no choice to accept them. I thought the two orphans showed the ‘softer’ side of Raylene (does she really have one though? maybe!) and the other two followers show potential romances (maybe? although her choice at the end rather surprised me). The book overall was really good and I had fun reading this. There were moments where the action was so fast paced and almost movie quality reading, and then there’s comedy moments where I found myself laughing out loud. I’m really looking forward to reading Hellbent, the next book that comes after this one. Greatly recommended for urban fantasy fans.
    • 5/5
      Raylene, known only as Cheshire Red to anyone with a badge, is a thief. She's not just any thief, either. Raylene is a thief straight out of James Bond... she has numerous secret identities, can leap razor wire in a single bound, and navigates maximum security buildings with ease. She's also a vampire. Raylenes' most recent case uncovers a creepy government operation that's treating vamps like lab rats, and Raylene is having none of that. She and her ex-Navy SEAL turned drag queen sidekick are on the case to make the world safer for vampires everywhere. Because vampires are people, too!The fact that I enjoyed this book so much came as a complete surprise. What I mistook for another campy, hot vampire with guns trope turned out to be smart and funny. Not to mention that there's a hot vampire with guns! If you like urban fantasy, you'll love this. If you enjoy Charlaine Harris then for the love of all things literary put that down and read this! It's somewhat-psychic vampire done right, with drag queens. I'm a-flutter for book two.
    • 4/5
      You want something that's locked up or hard to get to? Files, jewelry...porno videos with you in it? Then Raylene Pendle is the person you want to contact to get it for you. But she isn't your average thief, nope Raylene is the best of the best....and she's a vampire. But this new case sets her on a path that even she couldn't predict. Soon the FBI, the army, and the Men in Black are coming after her all to find out what she knows about this new case. Danger is around every corner, but Raylene meets up with some new folks that just may be able to help her out. And along the way she may solve the biggest mystery she's ever undertaken. Here's the biggest problem that I have with the story--in some places it doesn't flow as well as it should and gets overly wordy. I think part of the problem maybe that this is a new world for Cherie and she's trying to figure out how the characters work and she's cramming a lot of backstory into this first volume to set up this new world. That being said it's still a great adventure story and I love the characters, especially Raylene and the fact that she's not some sparkly vampire. She's a kick butt, no holds barred person with real human flaws. She suffers from OCD, is over prepared, and she isn't some lovey dovey goofy person (although she does fall for a character.) In other words she's just like the rest of us. And the story is being told directly from her perspective and it feels like we're talking with her about what went on and not reading it from some cold personal narrator. The characters are entertaining, interesting and different (I mean seriously how do you compete with a former Navy Seal that's a drag queen?)This first volume is an exciting, kickbutt, no holds barred feature with great characters and an fantastic premise. I look forward to reading future stories in this universe.
    • 4/5
      I was reading her blog while she was writing this and the one sentence summary seemed almost nonsensical, but, yes, there really is an OCD vampire thief, an ex-Navy SEAL drag queen and government/military conspiracies. And somehow it all works. I can fairly clearly hear Priest's personal tone of voice in this one, but her vampire protagonist has a fairly casual way of telling the story. I was a little uncomfortable with how long she spent on figuring out the pronouns for the drag queen, but she did settle on the sensible matching pronoun to represented gender solution. The action is non stop, they move around the country following leads, being ambushed and moving on to the next clue in her case. I had an inkling how she was being tracked, but liked the eventual twist. I was fairly happy with how she portrayed traceurs in the parkour scenes, though the DC club sounded much more into urban exploration than the New England one actually is. :) I'm looking forward to reading the next book when it comes out.
    • 5/5
      After a while, I get tired of vampire novels so it was really nice to find one that wasn't really a normal vampire novel. There have been vampire novels involving PIs, but nothing quite like Bloodshot. I'm a big fan of Priest's writing and so I was excited to find she had a new book. The vampire(s) in this novel are unlike maybe vampires I've encountered before. In some ways they remind me of the characters in my favorite vampire series (Blood and Smoke books by Tanya Huff), which is definitely a good thing. The plot (PI (who is really a thief) is hired by another vampire to find out what exactly happened to him -- so it can be reversed -- only to discover there's something even weirder lurking behind every corner). Priest uses technology extremely well, along with a combination of subverting traditional vampire myth and embracing it. I really hope this is the first in a series, because I really cannot wait to see what kind of adventures are in store.
    • 4/5
      Smart-mouthed, fast-talking, and a wee bit prone to panic attaches, Raylene Pendle, a.k.a. Cheshire Red, is no stranger to trouble. She's made more than one international most-wanted list for sticking her nose and her fingers where someone else doesn't want them - in fact, she makes her living doing so. It's a good gig - but retrieving other people's pornographic miss-steps is getting the tiniest bit boring. Her latest client promises to be something more interesting... and there's an old Chinese proverb about interesting times - not to mention being careful what you wish for....No zombies in this one - except for me the next day at work after I stayed up too late finishing. Raylene's commentary is a riot, and the plot doesn't suck. It will definitely be interesting to see what kind of trouble finds the group next.
    • 4/5
      Having only read Priest's Boneshaker series in the past, I wasn't sure what to expect from this book, but I'm glad I took a chance on it. The premise is basically a supernatural mystery story, and as I enjoy both mysteries and the supernatural, this works for me. The narrator is engaging and interestingly self-aware, and the other characters we meet were also quite intriguing. The mystery itself was compelling and held my attention. The heist scenes were fun, the action was easy to follow, and the people you want to see get shown up, do. The one minor quibble I had with the book is that it didn't quite feel like it knew where the end should be. There's a second book coming out soon, and the place that I thought this book would end and things that would be addressed in the second book felt a bit tacked on to the end of this one after what I thought was a more natural denouement. while just enough was left dangling that I didn't feel that, by resolving those things, there was a complete resolution of the story. Regardless, it's still intriguing, and well-written, and I'm quite excited to read more.