| Title | : | Bloodlist (Vampire Files, #1) |
| Author | : | |
| Rating | : | |
| ISBN | : | 0441067956 |
| ISBN-10 | : | 9780441067954 |
| Language | : | English |
| Format Type | : | Mass Market Paperback |
| Number of Pages | : | 200 |
| Publication | : | First published March 1, 1990 |
Bloodlist (Vampire Files, #1) Reviews
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Another fun adventure with Jack, newspaperman turned vampire in 1930's Chicago. It was well read by the same guy who still seems to think a Boston accent is the same as an English one, but that was the only rough part.
The story has plenty of twists, turns, & action in it. The characters are likeable or not, as the case may be, but are pretty well drawn & interesting. The world seems quite authentic, although I'm no expert. It's fun reading about the old cars & such.
I'd listen to the 3d one, but my library doesn't have any more, unfortunately. The only other stuff by Elrod are urban/PNR short story books she's edited & I can't handle any more PNR right now. I'm burned out on the run of the mill vampires, so I'll let that be my recommendation for this series. It's not. -
Bloodlist is the first book in fantasy author
P.N. Elrod Vampire Files series. I've enjoyed other books in the series and was glad to finally see how it all began. I was a bit disappointed actually. I mean it was an entertaining, action-filled series but I think there was a bit too much thrown into the mix and it left me feeling somewhat more confused.
I hoped the story might show how night club owner Jack Fleming became a vampire. Now it's very possible I missed it in this short novel, but I don't think so. There are intimations that he was made a vampire by a woman, Maureen, but that's about as far as it goes.
In this story, Jack is an ex-NY reporter who has moved to Chicago to start a new life. Maureen has disappeared, may be dead. The story starts sort of in the middle. Someone has tried to kill Jack and he wakes up on the shore of Lake Michigan. His memory of the events are very hazy but over the course of the novel, he begins to have visions of the events. Jack goes back to the town where his family are buried to get some soil that he can use as his hidey hole??? (vampire stuff). Staying in a hotel room, sleeping through the day in a steamer trunk with bags of soil, Jack wakes up one night and has a note from someone. This turns out to be PI Charles Escott (who turns up in all of the later novels). Escott knows he's a vampire. He offers to help Jack find out what happened to him.
As this series is set in the Capone - run Chicago (or just after), Jack begins to investigate mobsters who own night clubs. He's discovering his vampire powers; ability to fade out, ease through walls, over power with his mental strength, etc. As I say, there is a lot thrown out in this book. The investigation leads to more violence, murder attempts on Escott and Jack. We meet other characters from later books, African-American gangster and Escott's friend, Shoe Coldfield, and night club singer, Bobbi, who will become a love interest in later books.
The story is entertaining, somewhat frustrating, filled with action, murder / mayhem and vampirish activity, but also kind of confusing and leaves with more questions than answers. Now to find the 2nd book!! (3 stars) -
Part of my 2020 Social Distancing Read-a-thon
3.5 stars
An interesting mix of the hard-boiled detective genre and the vampire novel. Think Chelsea Quinn Yarbro and the Saint Germain Chronicles, that kind of vampire. Jack Fleming is basically a good guy and retains this MO even after his transformation.
Elrod has some interesting ideas for using the vampire mythos, plus she has set it in an interesting time period. Vampire vs. gangsters. Its difficult to avoid cliches when using either of these story lines, but Elrod doesn't go overboard.
I have the next 2 books available during this time of physical isolation, so I'll be seeing what other adventures Jack gets up to soon. -
The main character, Jack Flemming, is a reporter in Chicago during the Depression Era. He wakes up one morning with no memory of the past week...oh, and he is also a vampire.
I think the story was suposed to be a mobster mystery with a little dash of paranormal thrown in for good measure. Unfortunately, it didn't work for me. The characters all felt flat, and I couldn't bring myself to care about what happened to them. The whole vampire angle didn't help the plot along at all, either. Toward the end, the pace picked up ever so slightly, but still not enough to make it worthwhile. In fact, the more I think about it, the angrier I am that I wasted my time on this garbage. Boo! Two thumbs down! -
For HA 2022 Halloween Season Challenge: Vampire
This book has been sitting on my Overdrive Wishlist for several years. In all that time, I have just sort of ignored it, but I was looking for a book about vampires and I was recently informed that
Overdrive is being replaced by Libby 😒👎. So I am trying to weed through my 600+ wishlist. What I found is a wonderful new series.
This is noir and vampires set in 1920's Chicago. I loved the entire book including all the characters. I Can't wait to read the next book in the series. I hope my library has them all!!!! -
Bloodlist is the first book on the Vampire Files series by P.N. Elrod. They all feature newly turned vampire Jack Flemming. This book was okay. A bit different from what I was expecting based on the few short stories I've read featuring Jack Flemming. I listened to this on audio book; and the audio book was very well done.
Jack Flemming wakes up dead on a beach, or should I say undead. Someone has murdered him and, because of his association with a female vampire in his past, instead of dying Jack has turned into a vampire. With the help of the ever-curious private investigator Charles Escott; Jack and Charles try to track down Jack's history to find out who murdered Jack and why. This whole book takes place in Chicago in the 1930's and deals a lot with the gangs that were big during that time and with the Depression.
This book is written in a horror/mystery style. The book itself is very much a mystery/crime story. The writing is gory and fairly dark. There was a lot of action in the story; which was fun to read. Although I found Jack's vampiric powers to be pretty basic, traditional, and uninteresting. Although Jack makes good use of his powers some of the time, there are many times though where he doesn't use his powers and this lack of use doesn't really make sense. I didn't really like Jack much as a character. In the short story I read about Jack, Jack was much lighter and funnier than in this book. Charles is a hoot though and I really liked him.
I was waiting for some twists in the story or *something* to surprise me. Nothing really did though. This is a solid crime novel involving a vampire with slightly special powers. There is a lot of violence and dealing with gangsters. If that's your thing you would really like this book. Unfortunately I was looking for something a little more fantasy/sci fi and this book was surprisingly mundane in that area. The writing is fine, nothing special but nothing horrible either. I do not know if I will read any more books in this series or not. It will depend on what else I have to read. -
-Noir clásico mezclado con colmillos.-
Género. Narrativa Fantástica.
Lo que nos cuenta. A finales de los años treinta y cerca de las orillas del lago MÃchigan, en Chicago, Jack Fleming es atropellado y disparado con una pistola del calibre 45. Pero entre dudas, problemas de memoria y algo de desorientación, descubre que parece haberse convertido en un vampiro, lo que le puede servir de ayuda para tratar de entender qué le ha sucedido y tratar de aclarar la situación, mientras va experimentando sus nuevas capacidades. Primer libro de la serie Memorias de un vampiro, también conocida como Archivos vampÃricos.
¿Quiere saber más de este libro, sin spoilers? Visite:
http://librosdeolethros.blogspot.com/... -
Bloodlist
(Vampire Files #1)
by P.N. Elrod
This is a re-read for me. I read the whole series before. Each book as they came out and loved them. This year I thought I would re-read a lot of my favorites which is different for me because I normally don't re-read a lot at all!
This is one of my favorite vampire books. It's in the 1930's and it's about a guy that was dating a vampire then gets killed and comes back as a vampire but doesn't remember how he died. He meets a guy that has learned his vampire secret and is a private investigator. They become friends. There is also a hot chick too, of course! -
Interesting book by a new-to-me writer (yes, I know this book is, like, 30 years old). I'm so used to reading vampire books that are urban fantasy with some romance thrown in, that it was surprise to read a fantasy book with no romance really (the one scene really wasn't romantic at all), that was also a whodunit. I liked this book, and I'm kind of interested to see where the series goes.
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I’ve been meaning to get to this for years, and I’m glad I took it for a spin. The reader, Barrett Whitener, was quite good, with the exception of the English accent he did for Escott. I didn’t have to speed it up much to get the flow I wanted.
This is a fun take on vampires, and I’m up for reading another. I love the buddy cop vibe Fleming has with Escott, the tough guy talk from the 30’s setting, and the neat powers Fleming has. For a vampire, he’s a pretty good egg. -
Well, that was something I listened to. I can't say I loved it, not that it was actually bad. I was just rather bored with it, having expected more. The vampire aspect was totally pointless, Jack could have just been any prohibition-era gumshoe. (And I say that as someone who loves a good vampire novel.)
I did appreciate that he wasn't an alpha-asshole. He admitted to fear, cried and cared about his friends. It humanized him.
The book does suffer from the classic lack of female characters though. There is only one female character at all and she, of course, is the sexpot hooker-with-a heart. Cliched beyond mention!
Whitener did a fine job with the narration. -
An entertaining moderately hardboiled detective story but with a vampire as hero. Fun.
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I couldn't finish this. One of the worst books I've ever attempted to read.
Edit: I gave it another shot and finished. Still possibly the worst book I've ever read. -
I listened to this on audiobook. The narrator was ok. This was decent. It’s nothing notable. A standard noir story with a vampire element thrown in for good measure. If not for the vampire aspect of the story, I doubt it would be remembered very much at all.
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Notes:
Currently on Audible Plus
I enjoyed the first half more than the last half. It was a different take on vampires and becoming one. While the last half had more action, I wasn't a fan of Jack being a passive & reactive character. -
I bought this for the cover and it was better than I thought it would be. I might read on just to see how the MCs story progresses.
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Man...this is the worst vampire book ever. And it had such promise. Newly minted vamp, 1930s setting in Chicago, charming gangsters, potential for romance... I gave it two stars because Elrod did do a good job of capturing the atmosphere of the time, and I found that kind of interesting. But the rest? Meh. The writing is pretty flat and we're given copious amounts of tedious detail on everything but the things we're interested in. Like what kind of entertaining mischief could you get into if you were a vampire in Chicago in the 1930s?! No idea.
Journalist Jack Flemming wakes up dead (or, undead) and doesn't remember who killed him or why. He has a hunch, though, why he's a vampire. But that story line goes nowhere. As does the story line about why he's even in Chicago. Ditto for the plot potential for his new vamp powers, which could be cool, but he hardly ever uses with much effect. Case in point: The same gangster tries to kill or beat him to death at least TWO MORE TIMES (spoiler alert), and Jack doesn't do ANYTHING. Seriously?! Not even mind control to, you know, convince the gangster to quit kicking the shit out of him? No, because he feels too CONFLICTED about using mind control. Against a guy who killed him. And then tries to kill him again. By beating him to death.
And Flemming never eats anyone. Not even muggers or creeps. Where's the fun in that? Instead he goes to the stockyards to suck on cows. It's like if Woody Allan became a vampire, but with less personality. -
Jack Fleming, a reporter in 1930's Chicago knew that he would become a vampire after he died, he just didn't think it would happen so quickly. Unfortunately, after awakening undead, he doesn't remember who killed him or why and he'd really like to know. He ends up becoming friends with a private agent who takes Jack on as a client. If Jack can keep them both from being killed in the process of solving Jack's murder, it will definitely be a win for the good guys. I'd read Elrod's Gentleman Vampire series which I really liked but hadn't wanted to read this series. However, it turns out to be very appealing. Jack isn't naive but he's a good man (they shouldn't have to be mutually exclusive) and it makes it easy to root for him. At the same time, although short, this isn't a quick read. I like her take on vampires - the movie Dracula had just been released - and gangland Chicago, after Capone, is also interesting. She covered segregation and poverty and gets a lot to the fore in 200 pages.
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Chicago, 1936. Jack Fleming wakes up dead and can't remember how he got that way.
A fun homage to the hardboiled novels of the era, fast-paced, fun, and gritty all at once. This is an excellent start to the series and features one of my favorite opening sentences for sheer eye-catching surprise:The car was doing at least forty when the right front fender smashed against my left hip and sent me spinning off the road to flop bonelessly into a mass of thick, windblown grass.
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[audiobook:]
This book had a different take on vampires than the usual lore, which was interesting. However, overall, it didn't do much for me. The story wasn't bad, it was just kind of boring.
The part that was bad was the audiobook's narrator. His manner of speech was so robotic at times that it was almost comical. -
written for the time period after the depression, a detective novel with a vamp twist. Not you typical Vamp book. It reads like the ol' gum shoe books, interesting and cunfusing because of the different type of living/speech then. The characters draw you into the story well and carry it well.
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1930s noir and a vampire with a heart who interacts with the mob.
P. N. Elrod is amazing in her depiction of the time period. You can see, smell, feel, and hear it as you read.
Mob wars in Chicago complicate Jack's life. -
You know, I tried really, really hard to like this book. It didn't happen. From the "I'm bored even thought it's happening to me" tone to the "hey, would you look at that, I've a giant hole in me. Huh, whaddaya know?" bit... I just couldn't get into it.
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I know I read a couple books in this series when they first came out, but I don't recall which ones, or much beyond the identity of the main character.
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This book is really slow.
I'ts basically the good guy,turned into a vampire,keeps being good,and fights the bad.
No twists, the flattest plot I ever read. -
"(...) era lo que habÃan tenido que hacer los animales y la humanidad desde que Adán fue expulsado del ParaÃso: adaptarse o morir"
Cuando compré este libro no esperaba en absoluto que fuera bueno. Lo compré porque la portada trashy te hace saber claramente que va de vampiros y yo soy una persona simple: veo un libro de vampiros, y tengo que tenerlo. Incluso estoy en un maratón de leer un libro de vampiros al mes, y este fue el de marzo.
¿De qué va este libro? Nuestro protagonista, Jack Fleming es un periodista que ha dejado su empleo en Nueva York para empezar una vida desde cero en Chicago. La historia empieza cuando se despierta la orilla de un lago, sin recuerdos del último par de dÃas. De lo único de lo que está seguro es que ha muerto y que unos hombres lo persiguen. En este libro, Jack, un vampiro neófito, intentará descubrir quién lo mató y por qué. Contará con la ayuda de Charles Escott, un viejo detective privado, inglés, que quiere ayudarlo en su causa porque se siente intrigado por su condición. Jack está metido en un enredo con la mafia porque estaba en el lugar equivocado en el momento equivocado. Asà que sÃ, básicamente es el Padrino pero con un vampiro como protagonista y héroe.
Empecemos por lo bueno: me encantó que el libro no es tÃmido en referenciar a Drácula desde el principio. Tanto la pelÃcula como el libro son mencionados y son usados como referencia para el protagonista. Toma cosas de este vampiro clásico como el temor al agua en movimiento, y el hecho de tener que dormir en un lugar con tierra proveniente de su hogar. Jack como protagonista estuvo bastante bien. Era un vampiro bastante particular, lo cual se le agradece a PN Elrod: a diferencia de la mayorÃa de relatos, donde son el monstruo, y donde aparte, no tienen ninguna conexión, Jack nunca atacó a un humano (solo una vez, y fue por *amor* o whatever), se cuestionaba constantemente su condición, y además enviaba dinero a sus padres y hablaba con ellos por teléfono. No es todos los dÃas que encontramos a un vampiro con familia. Elrod nos da un vampiro que es un héroe, que quiere hacer el bien, y eso es novedoso, so good for her.
¿Lo malo? los personajes eran bastante planos, los diálogos ni decir, pero tal vez el problema fuera la traducción al español, asà que le doy el beneficio de la duda. El plot es harina de otro costal. No puedo culpar a la traducción por este plot tan... tan poco creÃble. A Jack lo capturan los mafiosos porque uno de sus contactos de sus dÃas de periodista le da una primicia: tiene una lista con personas involucradas en corrupción. Un mafioso de renombre utiliza esta lista para sobornar y tener a la gente bajo su control. Ahora, ¿por qué este contacto tiene esa lista? Porque el mafioso dejó su casa sin vigilancia y la caja fuerte abierta. Por favor. Y tampoco entiendo por qué Jack deja que lo torturen y no dice dónde está la lista, dice que teme morir cuando revele la información, pero él desde el principio sabe que tiene una posibilidad de convertirse en vampiro, asà que realmente no habÃa nada en juego.
Y no hablemos del instalove entre Jack y Bobbi. Bobbi is a queen, al final salva el dÃa como una mujer empoderada (después de todo siempre dijo que se sabÃa defender sola), ¿pero ese romance? solo se ven un par de veces y ya, es suficiente. Se aman, se encantan. No hay una construcción en su relación. Como tampoco la hay entre Jack y Escott, simplemente confÃan el uno en el otro against their better judgement y ya está. Pero su amistad al menos me pareció cool, también against my better judgement.
La primera mitad del libro se lee bastante rápido, la verdad. Ya después se pone un poco pesado, repetitivo, y la solución (la explicación de cómo consigue la lista) es poco satisfactoria. ¿RecomendarÃa el libro? solo a alguien que, como a mi, le guste mucho leer sobre vampiros y quiera ver este twist original que Elrod le da al mito, pero con la advertencia de que la ejecución es mediocre. Que es esa atracción de leer un libro que sabes que va a ser trashy pero igual no puedes resistirte.
Fue interesante leerlo, pero no será memorable. Creo que jamás habÃa leÃdo un libro de gangsters tampoco. Se queda en mi colección, pero solo como anécdota.
