Jennifer Jackson – Literary Agent

Bloodshot by Cherie Priest

Locus Award winner (Boneshaker (Sci Fi Essential Books), 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 can’t 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 Farnsworth’s Blood Oath (2010) and other crime readers who don’t mind a few vampires.

Grail by Elizabeth Bear

This deftly told story completes the Jacob’s Ladder trilogy begun in Dust and Chill. The Conns and the other inhabitants of an ancient wandering spaceship face their last and greatest challenge. They’ve finally found a habitable planet, but others beat them to it: “right-minded” humans, surgically altered to achieve emotional balance, and more alien to the Jacobites than extraterrestrials would be. Leaders on both ship and planet are willing to fight and kill to keep the two cultures from interacting, while old enemies aboard the Jacob’s Ladder re-emerge to wreak destruction. The story is poised on a knife’s edge, with the Jacobites facing both possible annihilation and inner demons just as they’re closing in on their goal. Bear’s talent for portraying cultural divergence and conflict is especially apparent in this intense wrapup. –Publishers Weekly

Pack of Lies by Laura Anne Gilman

Gilman’s second Paranormal Scene Investigations is a fast, compelling read. Following Bonnie’s POV is fantastic, and the secondary characters are equally well drawn, especially Pietr and Sharon. Bonnie’s intelligence and perceptiveness really make this book go and readers will root for her and the team to solve their investigation. Gilman handles an extremely sensitive subject with grace and compassion.

Bonnie Torres and the rest of the PUPI team have been called out to the scene of a horrific crime – a ki-rin’s human companion was attacked, and the attackers ended up dead or gravely injured by the ki-rin (a unicorn-like creature, with the attendant purity requirement). Things are always more complicated than they appear on the surface, especially with tensions between the human and fatae heating up. Also heating up is the relationship between Bonnie and her boss, Benjamin Venec – and since he’s her boss, that may not be exactly the brightest idea either of them has ever had. — Romantic Times, 4 1/2 Stars, Top Pick

Bad Bird: A Mystery by Chris Knopf

In Knopf’s engaging second Hamptons mystery to feature defense attorney Jacqueline “Jackie” Swaitkowski (after 2010’s Short Squeeze: A Mystery), Jackie witnesses the crash of a small airplane that kills pilot Eugenie Birkson, and later retrieves the camera case Eugenie tosses from the plane. It doesn’t take much to pique Jackie’s curiosity, and before long she’s involved with tracking down information about Eugenie and the five photos on the camera’s memory card. Her investigation uncovers a startling link to her own family’s history as well as Eugenie’s. The excellent supporting cast–Sam Acquillo, the star of the author’s first four Hamptons mysteries; Jackie’s boyfriend, Harry Goodlander; Southampton cop Joe Sullivan; computer guru Randall Dodge–provide valuable assistance when Jackie’s efforts stir up threats. Domestic problems and Homeland Security issues enliven a plot with slick twists that should keep readers switching their bets to the very end. –Publishers Weekly

Bloodshot by Cherie Priest

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, exNavy 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.

–Kirkus, Starred Review