Blood Like Mine

by Stuart Neville

Overview

Notes From Your Bookseller

A desperate mother and daughter on the run. An FBI agent closing in on his target. A ruthless monster on the loose. You'll be reading this one from behind your fingers.

A New York Times Best Horror Fiction of the Year Selection • Goodreads Choice Award Nominee for Horror • A Parade Best Horror Books of the Year Selection

“A gruesome, action-packed monster novel about a mother and daughter with a terrible secret, on the run from an obsessed and crumbling detective . . . Terrific.” —The New York Times Book Review

In Stuart Neville’s horror debut, a mother's undying love and a daughter's insatiable hunger carve a bloody trail across the highways of the Southwest.

On a snowy December night, single mother Rebecca Carter drives her van into a snowbank to avoid hitting an elk on a desolate mountain highway. She is at the end of her rope, out of money and food. Still, she refuses help from a man in a pickup truck—Rebecca’s adolescent daughter, Moonflower, is on the run from a grisly secret, and the last thing they can afford is to be remembered by anyone they meet.

Meanwhile, Special Agent Marc Donner of the FBI has spent the better part of two years hunting down a gruesome serial killer who drains victims of blood before severing their spinal cords, leaving a trail of bodies throughout the country. As Agent Donner’s investigation brings him closer and closer to where Rebecca and Moonflower are hiding out, in the foothills of Colorado, the life that Rebecca has fought so hard to hold together for her daughter becomes increasingly imperiled.

In this deadly, high-stakes game of cat and mouse, nobody is safe and nothing is certain—not even the line between predator and prey.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781641295413
Publisher:	Soho Press, Incorporated
Publication date:	08/06/2024
Series:	The Blood Trilogy , #1
Pages:	384
Sales rank:	7,374
Product dimensions:	5.70(w) x 8.30(h) x 1.40(d)

About the Author

Stuart Neville, the “king of Belfast noir” (The Guardian), is the author of nine novels, including The Ghosts of Belfast, The House of Ashes, and Ratlines, as well as numerous short stories. He has won the Los Angeles Times Book Prize and been shortlisted for the Edgar, Macavity, Dilys, Barry, and Anthony Awards and the CWA Steel Dagger. He lives near Belfast.

Editorial Reviews

06/03/2024

Neville (The House of Ashes) gives the serial killer thriller a novel spin in this riveting splice of crime and weird fiction. FBI agent Marc Donner is a cybercrime specialist skilled at drawing out pedophiles and groomers by posing as vulnerable young people on social media. When some of his predator quarry turn up murdered with their throats slashed and their spinal cords severed, Marc speculates it’s the work of a serial killer—and he’s right. In a parallel story line, Rebecca Carter and her 12-year-old daughter employ the same sorts of online trickery to lure their victims as they cut a bloody swath from Wisconsin to Arizona. After tantalizing the reader with the prospect that the mother-daughter duo are female Dexters, Neville torques his tale fully into uncanny territory with a spectacular confrontation between Donner and the pair that propels his plot into the realm of the supernatural. The chapters toggle between Marc’s and Rebecca’s perspectives, sustaining breathless suspense as the story builds to its wild and cinematic finale. This is a satisfying exercise in high-voltage horror. (Aug.)

Publishers Weekly

07/01/2024

At the heart of this hybrid of horror and suspense there is a deeply felt but perhaps harmful mother/daughter relationship. Single mother Rebecca Carter has been traveling across the Southwest and living a hardscrabble life with her strange daughter Monica, whom Rebecca calls Moonflower. Because of what Moonflower is and the trail of bodies they leave in their wake, mother and daughter can never stay in one place for long. It is this trail of bodies that FBI agent Marc Donner follows until mother, daughter, and lawman collide. Mostly known for writing thrillers, Neville (The House of Ashes) tries his hand at horror, with solid results. Neville nails the scenes where Donner attempts to track down Rebecca and Moonflower, filling them with a crackling energy, even as Donner's desire to apprehend them begins to poison his life outside the investigation. He also reveals his horror-writing chops, centering the horror within the emotionally deep yet frayed relationship between mother and daughter, showing through letters and journal entries how deeply Rebecca loves Moonflower. VERDICT Fans of monster-themed books like Liz Kerin's "Night's Edge" series and Neville's other mysteries and thrillers should give this novel attempt at horror a taste.—James Gardner

Library Journal

Praise for Blood Like Mine

New York Times Best Horror Fiction of 2024
Nominated for a Goodreads Choice Award for Horror
Parade’s Best Horror Books of 2024
B&N Reads’ Best Horror Books of 2024
Goodreads’ Biggest Horror Reads of Summer
Goodreads Readers’ Most Anticipated Summer Books
Deadly Pleasures’ Most Anticipated Mysteries and Thrillers of 2024

“A gruesome, action-packed monster novel about a mother and daughter with a terrible secret, on the run from an obsessed and crumbling detective. But at its tender core, the book is actually about family and love. This is a terrific novel that takes the fast pace and tension of crime fiction and injects it with the explosiveness of a great vampire story.”
—Gabino Iglesias, The New York Times Book Review

“Stuart Neville at his very, very best—this book grabs your heart and doesn't let go.”
—Ruth Ware, New York Times bestselling author of The Woman in Cabin 10

“Stephen King-esque horror . . . Blood Like Mine hinges not on the violence that drives it, but on the nature of mother-daughter relationships – and the question of whether a bond so strong and animal is always bound for destruction . . . An intricate tapestry of twists, turns, and razor-sharp plotting.”
—Starburst Magazine

“A desperate mother and daughter on the run. An FBI agent closing in on his target. A ruthless monster on the loose. You’ll be reading this one from behind your fingers.”
—B&N Reads, Most Anticipated Books August 2024

“Mesmerising . . . Surely indebted to Stephen King for the deftness with which it embeds the gothic in everyday Americana, Blood Like Mine gains in power as it advances towards a denouement that shows Marc and Rebecca as doppelgängers: both isolated, both self-annihilated by destructive obsessions they originally saw as protecting other people.”
—The Times (UK)

“A modern and empathetic take on an ancient trope . . . Blood Like Mine is beautifully constructed and it moves at an electric pace. As Donner begins to close in on the pair the tension is raised to nerve-shredding levels, and it all builds to a terrific climax.”
—The Big Issue

“A stunningly original and powerful marriage of thriller and Stephen King-like horror.”
—Irish Independent

“A terrifically entertaining book with the same tense pacing and persuasive characters of his earlier Belfast novels.”
—The Irish Times

“Enjoyably character-driven storytelling, which powers along at a pleasingly rapid, page-turning clip.”
—The Irish News

“Gutwrenching . . . Instils a sense of dread. You have been warned.”
—Irish Examiner

“This is not the book you think it is . . . For fans of a twisty thriller horror novel.”
—WAMC’s The Roundtable

“Blood Like Mine is a violent, action-packed thriller that demands a sequel.”
—SFRevu

“Superbly written . . . Generate[s] great suspense but also goes beyond simply heightening tension so that readers' sympathies are engaged while our moral sensibilities are also addressed.”
—Reviewing the Evidence

“Stuart Neville has wrung the changes on a well-used set up in a truly original way . . . A powerful story about the uncomfortably close relationship between love and obsession . . . Anyone looking for an intelligent thriller with difficult questions and painfully realistic relationships at its heart, needs to put this book on their reading list.”
—SHOTS Crime & Thriller EZine

“Blood Like Mine places a mother in a horrifying situation with no good options . . . Pulse-pounding dark writing drives this horror/thriller novel that poses the question of how far would you go for someone you love.”
—Fresh Fiction

“An action-packed thriller, the midway twist in this book will leave you as breathless as several victims on the pages of this relentlessly paced and unexpectedly moving story as the reader is propelled towards the truly shocking conclusion. Bravo Stuart Neville! Utterly brilliant.”
—Liz Nugent, author of Strange Sally Diamond

“I absolutely loved Blood Like Mine . . . Thrilling, heartbreaking, and completely compelling. My heart was in my throat the whole time.”
—Alex North, author of The Whisper Man

“Beautiful and dark as all hell. Poignant. Nightmarish . . . Original, terrifying and horrifically tense. This book is your next obsession (and Neville might well be Stephen King's rightful heir).”
—Will Dean, author of The Last Thing to Burn

“Wow, just WOW. I’ve waited a long time for a crime novel to do something different, to keep me guessing, to blow me away—this is that book . . . I lived and breathed every second and flew through the pages—desperate to keep reading but not wanting it to end. Wholly originally and utterly compelling, this is an incredibly tense book that is also full of regret, guilt, and love. Blood Like Mine will grip you from the first page and keep you prisoner until you turn the last page. I absolutely loved it.”
—C. L. Taylor, author of The Guilty Couple

“A heart-pounding fusion of horror and crime thriller, Blood Like Mine redefines the roles of cat and mouse while packing punches both visceral and emotional. This propulsive, blood-spattered pursuit across the American Southwest will leave readers horrified and hungry for more.”
—Luke Dumas, USA Today bestselling author of The Paleontologist and A History of Fear

“This is quite simply the best crime novel I’ve read this year. A stunning work of fiction that seized me by the throat from the first page to the last. I won’t stop thinking about this one for some time.”
—Cass Green, author of In a Cottage in a Wood

“Blood Like Mine is Stuart Neville at his considerable best. A shocking and powerful thriller that is as moving as it is gripping. This is a book you will not forget in a hurry and which will leave you hungry for the next installment.”
—Mark Billingham, author of the Tom Thorne novels

“What a book! Exciting, propulsive, and vivid. A thriller with real bite.”
—Mark Edwards, author of Keep Her Secret

“At its core, Blood Like Mine is the story of a mother's unconditional love for her daughter, and that gives everything that happens—the growing horror, the murders, the frantic desperation—an almost unbearable emotional punch. I've not read anything quite like this before, and once it sank its teeth in, I was utterly gripped . . . and I'm eager for more.”
—Tim Lebbon, author of Eden

“A visceral, cinematic masterpiece. Silence of the Lambs filtered through the lens of prime Stephen King. You won’t read a more gut-wrenching novel this year.”
—Ed James, author of the DI Simon Fenchurch novels

“I haven't stopped thinking about this since I devoured it. A tense, dark thriller that combines jaw-dropping horror with gut-punching tenderness, this is a book that will get under your skin and stay there forever.”
—S. J. I. Holliday, author of Violet

“A masterclass in storytelling, Blood Like Mine is a dark, chilling tale that will grip you from the very first page. Steeped in the emotion of love and loss, Neville's characters are captivating and leap off the page to grab you by the throat—this is a story that you won't forget.”
—Sam Blake, author of Little Bones

“Riveting . . . Horror fans will be entranced.”
—Booklist, Starred Review

“Neville gives the serial killer thriller a novel spin in this riveting splice of crime and weird fiction . . . Sustain[s] breathless suspense as the story builds to its wild and cinematic finale. This is a satisfying exercise in high-voltage horror.”
—Publishers Weekly

“Crackling energy . . . [For] fans of monster-themed books like Liz Kerin’s ‘Night’s Edge’ series.”
—Library Journal

Praise for Stuart Neville

“Noir, noir, noir—everybody wants to write noir fiction. But most self-anointed 'noir' narratives just don’t hack it. They’re dark and dreary, to be sure; but a true noir mystery must also have a black heart. This kind of spiritual despair comes naturally to Stuart Neville, whose Belfast crime novels bleed.”
—The New York Times Book Review

“Tightly wound, emotionally resonant . . . Displays an acute understanding of the true state of Northern Ireland, still under the thumb of decades of violence.”
—Los Angeles Times

“The current master of neo-noir detective fiction.”
—The Boston Globe

“The dread in this novel is palpable from the first pages until the heartbreaking final ones. It's Neville's best yet.”
—Milwaukee Journal Sentinel

“A great, brawling ache of a novel . . . filled with both prickling suspense and fiercely wrought emotion.”
—Megan Abbott

“In the world of modern crime fiction, Stuart Neville is a supernova.”
—Dennis Lehane

“Chilling, compassionate and compelling, Stuart Neville takes us straight to the dark heart of rural Ireland.”
—Val McDermid

“A brilliant, atmospheric novel from Stuart Neville that plays with chronology and the idea that evil can linger in the dark places. Neville writes with care and empathy and his characters will stay with you for a long time. In a storied career, this may well be Stuart Neville's best book.”
—Adrian McKinty

“Superlative . . . A pulse-pounding crime novel from a master of the genre.”
—Booklist, Starred Review

“[A] gut-wrenching novel of psychological suspense with ghostly undertones . . . This unforgettable tale of servitude and subservience, domestic abuse, and toxic masculinity builds to a resolution offering redemption and heartfelt solace. Neville has outdone himself.”
—Publishers Weekly, Starred Review

From the Publisher