Blood Will Tell (Paperback)

~ (Author)
Key Phrases: sun allergy, nerve pinch, blood will tell, Doc Sanford, Dan Martin, Rory Sanford (more...)

Editorial Reviews

From Booklist

Kentucky police detective and Olympic gold-medal marksman Brandy Mather is intrigued by the smiling, aged body found in the office of a heretofore missing professor, who now is deemed to have died of old age. When other corpses, including Brandy's best friend, turn up with the same expression, she is determined to solve their cases. While investigating she meets Professor Dan Martin, to whom she is mysteriously drawn. As their relationship progresses he reveals that he is a hereditary vampire who does not kill. Meanwhile, the judge whom Brandy and her partner suspect of working with drug dealers seems to be involved up to his eyeballs, or retractable fangs. Although Lorrah's writing is clunky and some of the plot elements so obvious that one wants to shake Brandy, who is amazingly obtuse given that she is described as astute and intuitive, Lorrah's vampire lore and the twists and turns her revelation of it entail make her novel--an interesting combination of mystery, romance, and horror--worth reading. Diana Tixier Herald
Copyright © American Library Association. All rights reserved

Review

"I wish every book was this satisfying, this exciting and profound. I love this book. It's right." -- Jacqueline Lichtenberg of Simegen Reviews

..."An intriguing blend of police procedure, science fiction, and romance..." -- Margaret L. CarterAuthor, The Vampire in Literature: A Critical Bibliography --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

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Product Details

• Paperback: 288 pages
• Publisher: Benbella Books; First Trade Paper Edition edition (March 11, 2003)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 1932100032
• ISBN-13: 978-1932100037
• Product Dimensions: 9.2 x 6.1 x 0.6 inches
• Shipping Weight: 13.6 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 3.9 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (13 customer reviews)
• Amazon.com Sales Rank: #1,606,264 in Books (See Bestsellers in Books)

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

11 of 12 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars A Must Read Item!, May 6, 2003

By	Juanita J. Nesbitt (Des Plaines IL) - See all my reviews (REAL NAME)

I have been an avid reader of vampire fiction for many years I can see why it won the best vampire novel of 2001. It didn't use any of the usual clichés of the genre.
I found all of the characters intriguing and didn't want to put the book down. I especially liked the way Jean handled the whole relationship between Dan and Brandy.
Her theories about vampires are unique and intriguing. I found the last few chapters to be wonderfully nail biting and went to bed rather late because I had to read them before I slept. It will definitely be on my list of rereads that I do once in a while.
Run, do not walk to your favorite bookstore and buy a copy or order it from here!

11 of 12 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Oh yeah!, April 23, 2003

By	Huntress Reviews (United States) - See all my reviews

Brandy Mather is a detective in a small, Kentucky town. In such a place, there should not be a rash of murders, especially not ones as baffling as the ones she is now trying to solve. The first victim was supposed to be only in early middle age, but appeared to be an old man who died with a very odd expression on his face. It is not long before other bodies begin appearing, one of them her own best friend. Brandy seeks help from computer genius, Dan Martin. What she gets is a lot more.

She begins to fall in love with Dan, but a mysterious secret keeps them apart at first. Dan has an inside track on the killer that is completely unexpected, and shocking. Brandy finds that she is facing an other worldly villain that will attempt to corrupt her very soul. Small town politics and murders may be what she is fighting on the surface, but the truth is one she can hardly believe. Vampires are real.

***** In a complex and fast paced plot, readers are given a new twist on the old legends. Dan is an appealing hero, but not as other worldly and brooding as many heroes in this genre are. Brandy is a modern, strong willed woman whom many readers will find similiar to themselves. If it is possible, this would make a fantastic continuing series.

6 of 6 people found the following review helpful:

2.0 out of 5 stars Some good ideas, but skipable, September 25, 2005

By	Steffi's Book Luvs (Los Angeles, CA) - See all my reviews

It's by no means the worst thing I've read, but it's not really worth spending that much time with, either. It's kind of a shame, because there are some interesting twists on the genre. Most of the vampires seem to want to have a mainstream life, which could be interesting, and she does deal a little with the difficulties for the vampire characters of trying to have a normal life while you have to keep changing identies. She also makes vampirism a genetic disorder, which is a nice science-y variation, but it gets screwed up with a goofy twist. It's genetic, so you can't pass it on, but if the vampire's really, really in wuv with a soulmate, they get to live almost as long as the vampire. Aaaw. This basically is to allow having your cake & eating it too for the main characters, and it's kind of annoying since the vampire character asserts that there's nothing supernatural about the disorder.
The big problem is that main characters aren't really that interesting, and have one of the flattest romances I've seen in a while. The "mystery" is see-through, and if the main character were actually as smart and inquisitive as she's supposed to be, the book would be about 100 pages shorter. The book is also trapped in a "Young Adult" writing style, so much so that I wonder if it was originally intended as one. If so, it would explain at least one of the rythm-killing tangents the book takes, where lead character cop Brandy goes to give a "keep your kids off drugs" lecture to the local PTA for an otherwise inexplicable half a chapter.