Surprised? You shouldn’t be. I enjoy a wide range of novels and I have followed the exploits of Lucas Davenport for a few years. I haven’t read them all yet but I am getting there, more than half done. When John Sandford spun off Virgil Flowers I have been there since the first novel, enjoying each one. I enjoyed this one but the subject matter made me cringe on occasion. What is the heinous crime no one else has been able to unearth till that %^&*(* Flowers comes along: incest, rape, child pornography, and rape of minors. Heavy stuff alright! Being female and reading this stuff is a real kick in the pants.)
I have no idea why John Sandford picked this subject matter to use as his vehicle for our hero. I know I am too small a peanut and just a beginner at this to be able to get an answer about that question also. Maybe the next novel will have something a little lighter as it main plotline. Who knows? The thing I did enjoy this for was Sandford’s skill as a writer. The way he moved the plotline forward, weaving all the different threads that others couldn’t pull and tie together till Flowers came on the scene and started to put it all together. Flowers is an amazing character and I wish he had spun him off earlier. He has such depth and yet he is as flawed as any of us. I enjoyed the different scenes in the novel when he was able to go toe to toe with the so called Church people and out quote them in Bible verses.
Then when done with that move on to other things that make Virgil, Virgil, wink, wink. All things aside with the subject matter. The subject itself turns me off and offends me, but Sandford’s style and writing ability make that seem so far in the background that I was able to enjoy this novel. I am going to give Bad Blood four stars because of that. I think if I had started to read a novel with this subject in someone else’s hands I may have put it down. What are your thoughts on this novel? Have you read the whole thing or did you have to put it down?
