Blood Victory

by Pa Rock
Reader

"Blood Victory" is the third novel in what author Christopher Rice has termed his "Burning Girl" series.  The first two titles in the series were "Bone Music" and "Blood Echo."

The "burning girl" at the center of these thriller novels is Charlotte "Charley" Rowe, a young woman who, as an infant, fell victim, along with her mother, to a married pair of serial killers.  The mother was killed by her captors, and the killers raised Charlotte as their own daughter.  Young Charlotte, not knowing her personal history, was eventually rescued from the captivity of her mother's killers and sent to live with her biological father, a parent she never knew and who had been estranged from her mother.  The father raised her more as a sideshow freak than as a daughter, and he concentrated on enhancing her "story" of captivity and making a living off of exploiting her to the curious world.  Eventually Charlotte reached an age where she was able to understand that her father was manipulating her for profit, and she escaped to the home of her maternal grandmother in California who gave the girl her first experience with some form of a normal life.

That bit of normalcy was short-circuited when her grandmother died, and Charley, now a young adult, fled to Arizona to hide from curiosity-seekers and stalkers and to enter therapy.  Unfortunately she chose the wrong therapist and soon found herself the emotional prisoner of yet one more person who was not acting in her best interests.

The therapist, who was really a chemist working for a multi-national pharmaceutical concern, slipped Charley a special drug that he had invented which he hoped would give her super physical and healing powers when the was emotionally triggered.    Then he created and cast her into a position where she was emotionally triggered.    A  physical marvel - or monster - resulted that could challenge and destroy some of the most savage criminals in the world.

The new Charley was a killing machine who began working in partnership with the young head of the pharmaceutical company that developed the drug that gave her the special powers.  Together with a team of experts and some cutting-edge technology, they began identifying serial killers and eliminating them via Charley's special powers.  Once a serial killer had been identified and his method of operation sussed out, she would manage to become his next victim to learn the details of the operation, look for any hidden survivors, and then take him out.  

"Blood Victory" has Charley being captured by a trucker in Dallas, Texas, a man she and her team believe tortures and kills young women in the back of his truck.  It is only after Charley is abducted, however, that it becomes obvious that this serial killer is actually part of a much larger operation, and that in addition to saving herself, Charley and the team must also be concerned with identifying and rescuing other women who are in other trucks - and all being transported to an unknown location and fate.

"Blood Victory" is an exciting tale with plenty of action and cutting-edge science to keep the pages turning, and it also offers up a couple of romantic storylines to occasionally calm the pace.  It's a well plotted story, well told through the exceptionally fine writing of Christopher Rice.  

And Christopher Rice never disappoints!