Everand Logo

Welcome to Everand!

  • Discover millions of ebooks, audiobooks, and so much more with a free trial

    Only $11.99/month after trial. Cancel anytime.

    Unavailable
    Blood Men: A Thriller
    Unavailable
    Blood Men: A Thriller
    Unavailable
    Blood Men: A Thriller
    Ebook387 pages6 hours

    Blood Men: A Thriller

    By Paul Cleave

    4/5

    ()

    Currently unavailable

    Currently unavailable

    About this ebook

    From international bestselling author Paul Cleave comes a gripping thriller about a dedicated family man, who may or may not have inherited his serial killer father’s penchant for violence.

    WINNER OF NEW ZEALAND’S PRESTIGIOUS NGAIO MARSH AWARD FOR BEST CRIME NOVEL OF 2011

    Edward Hunter has it all—a beautiful wife and daughter, a great job, a bright future . . . and a very dark past.

    Twenty years ago, a serial killer was caught, convicted, and locked away in New Zealand’s most hellish penitentiary. That man was Edward’s father. Edward has struggled his entire life to put the nightmares of his childhood behind him. But a week before Christmas, violence once again makes an unwelcome appearance in his world. Is Edward destined to be just like his father, to become a man of blood? A true master of the genre, Paul Cleave unveils a brutally vivid picture of a killer’s mind and a city of fallen angels captured at the ends of the earth.
    LanguageEnglish
    PublisherAtria Books
    Release dateJul 20, 2010
    ISBN9781439189634
    Unavailable
    Blood Men: A Thriller
    Author

    Paul Cleave

    Paul Cleave is the internationally bestselling author of ten award-winning crime thrillers, including Joe Victim, which was a finalist for the 2014 Edgar and Barry Awards, Trust No One and Five Minutes Alone, which won consecutive Ngaio Marsh Awards in 2015 and 2016. He lives in Christchurch, New Zealand. 

    Read more from Paul Cleave

    Related to Blood Men

    Related ebooks

    Thrillers For You

    View More
    View More

    Related podcast episodes

    Related articles

    • Article

      Michael Robotham

      Jul 29, 2021

      Last year, Michael Robotham saw his 2017 novel The Secrets She Keeps turn into a six-part psychological thriller drama TV series for Network Ten, starring Downton Abbey’s Laura Carmichael. “It was fascinating, exciting and slightly surreal seeing m

      1 min read

    • Article

      September’s BOOK CLUB

      Aug 4, 2022

      It’s been a decade since Hannah was at Oxford, yet she’ll never forget it. Her room-mate, April, was killed by one of the university porters. Now he’s dead and Hannah wonders if she helped send an innocent man to prison. But if Hannah digs too deep,

      4 min read

    • Article

      Sick Game

      Jul 9, 2020

      Sick Game
      2 min read

    • Article

      Killer instinct

      Oct 24, 2019

      Killer instinct
      3 min read

    • Article

      Paul Tremblay

      Jun 17, 2020

      IT’S ALWAYS BEEN ONE OF MY BIGGEST FEARS that I would live to see the end of everything,” says Paul Tremblay, speaking to SFX from his Massachusetts home in the middle of lockdown. It’s a singularly peculiar time, and a peculiar interview for him to

      3 min read

    • Article

      Great Reads

      Aug 9, 2019

      By Chandler Baker Sloane, Ardie, Grace, and Rosalita have worked at Truviv, Inc. for years. The sudden death of Truviv’s CEO means their boss, Ames, will likely take over the entire company. Each of the women has a different relationship with Ames,

      1 min read

    • Article

      Siphons

      Feb 6, 2020

      Siphons
      6 min read

    • Article

      David Sedaris

      Sep 15, 2017

      Our house on Emerald Isle, The Sea Section, is divided down the middle, and has an E beside one front door and a W beside the other. The east side is ruled by Hugh, and the bedroom we share is on the top floor. It opens onto a deck that overlooks the

      12 min read

    • Article

      Q + A

      Nov 28, 2022

      Q + A
      10 min read

    • Article

      Festival

      Sep 15, 2018

      My husband, who loved festivals, who was a great fan of festivals, wanted to get to the square in time for the first band at eleven o’clock. From bed, the dog and I watched him dress. He tried on various T-shirts, declaring some of them too tight and

      13 min read

    • Article

      The Drawings That Trapped A Paedophile

      Oct 18, 2022

      Sitting cross-legged on the living room floor after school one day, I giggled away as I watched my favourite cartoons. But when I heard the sound of footsteps behind me, my laughter suddenly stopped. ‘Come sit with me,’ my stepdad David, then 32, whi

      4 min read

    • Article

      Ordinary People

      Feb 24, 2021

      Ordinary People
      11 min read

    • Article

      The woman IN WHITE

      Apr 21, 2021

      The woman IN WHITE
      2 min read

    • Article

      END of Days

      Dec 21, 2021

      END of Days
      4 min read

    • Article

      Life After Death

      May 27, 2022

      Life After Death
      14 min read

    • Article

      Now That I’ve Arrived

      Dec 30, 2020

      Now That I’ve Arrived
      5 min read

    • Article

      The Problem with My Dachshund

      Dec 11, 2019

      The Problem with My Dachshund
      10 min read

    • Article

      After “The End”

      Oct 10, 2022

      I walked down the road with a hunched back and a wet cigarette in my mouth—the fire had died a while back. My hands were tucked into the pockets of my jacket, and my hair fell over my face, limiting my sight. But I wasn’t really seeing where I was go

      10 min read

    • Article

      Shame Is Ever-Present When You’re Sitting in a Cell

      Oct 23, 2020

      Between a strained relationship with my family and the death of a good friend, I’ve struggled to feel like I’m worth something.

      5 min read

    • Article

      Quarantine Album

      Sep 8, 2020

      It all started with a very simple request: I asked my mom, when she had time, could she look through old photos to see if there were any of pint-size me decked out for Halloween—primo Instagram content for my show Scream, Queen! (a podcast about scar

      4 min read

    • Article

      Stolen Happiness

      Sep 3, 2020

      Stolen Happiness
      3 min read

    • Article

      Stand-Up Gal

      Jan 15, 2024

      Stand-Up Gal
      4 min read

    • Article

      Two Poems

      Mar 1, 2019

      It’s 1 AM on the east coast and midnight in Iowawhen the Russian lawyer with a house in Newarkand an office in the city sends me an e-mail:“Your writing is so emotional yet so detached.It’s wonderful.” I respond without delay:“Dear Oleg, I don’t know

      3 min read

    • Article

      Not My Fault

      Apr 18, 2024

      Not My Fault
      4 min read

    • Article

      Hell Is A City in Texas

      Jun 14, 2021

      Hell Is A City in Texas
      10 min read

    • Article

      Proverbs Of A Faceless Time

      Dec 1, 2023

      Proverbs Of A Faceless Time
      9 min read

    • Article

      My Phantom Flatmate

      Jan 26, 2022

      My Phantom Flatmate
      2 min read

    • Article

      Corsicana

      Mar 15, 2022

      Corsicana
      11 min read

    Reviews for Blood Men

    4/5

    55 ratings10 reviews

    What did you think?

    Tap to rate

    Review must be at least 10 words

    • 4/5
      A deceptive book. I fully expected this to be a simple thriller following stock plot lines. Only reason I started it was because it was set in New Zealand, Boy was I surprised. This one had a lot of depth. Edward is the son of a serial killer and how he reacts in the wake of his wife being murdered will cause you to think deeper about your own morality. Strongly recommend this one.
    • 4/5
      I love this series! This was a page-turning wild ride for me. This book features Schroder as the main investigator but what I like about this series is that all the books are set in the same "world" not always having the same lead characters but others always pop in for cameo appearances. The son of a serial killer gets caught in a bank robbery where his wife is killed. This starts Edward on a terrifying journey he has no control over. The plot is a little far-fetched for this one but that did nothing to stop my enjoyment. It was a whirlwind read from start to finish which I could hardly put down except to sleep briefly.
    • 5/5
      What's it About?Edward Hunter has it all—a beautiful wife and daughter, a great job, a bright future . . . and a very dark past. Twenty years ago, a serial killer was caught, convicted, and locked away in New Zealand’s most hellish penitentiary. That man was Edward’s father. Edward has struggled his entire life to put the nightmares of his childhood behind him. But a week before Christmas, violence once again makes an unwelcome appearance in his world. Is Edward destined to be just like his father, to become a man of blood? What Did I Think?I loved the book ...however it is diffidently not for everyone. Most people that enjoy true-crime type mysteries expect to sometimes find some really graphic and gruesome scenes when it comes to the murders. "Blood Men" had more than it's share and that alone will put a lot of people off. It lost a half star with me because I lost patience with the police. They were working against a killer's very real time schedule but seemed to drag their feet at every turn. Otherwise the main character... Edward...was pitied...applauded...and encouraged by the reader through out this madhouse adventure as he almost single handed searched the town of Christchurch for his young wife's killer. Read it with caution...but if you enjoy this type of mystery...by all means read it.
    • 4/5
      Edward Hunter is the son of a serial killer. His father has been in prison for twenty years for the killing of at least eleven prostitutes. Edward has a wife and child, a good job and lives a happy life, he hates what his father did and feels he is nothing like him, yet when a tragedy occurs and he loses everything he holds dear, he starts hearing an inner voice that wants him to seek revenge.Blood Men by Paul Cleave is a suspense thriller that although is full of violence and gore, doesn’t quite deliver on the suspense. Edward is a little too philosophical to be believable as a man who only wants to hurt others. Although after visiting his father in prison, he learns that his father also has a dark, inner voice, he still questions whether they are both “blood men” - men who are driven to acts of violence. Edward goes through the motions of tracking those he holds accountable, but it is obvious that he is really just a deeply troubled man searching for answers.Blood Men is a well written, gritty crime novel that, for me, just missed the mark. This is the fourth book in his “Christchurch Murders” and some of these books have been excellent which insures that I will continue on with the series.
    • 5/5
      Note: This book is part of the Christchurch Mysteries series but it works just fine as a stand alone. It does reference the main character in the Theodore Tate mysteries in a few small ways and chronologically, happens after Book 1 (Cemetery Lake).Edward Hunter lost his father when he was 9 years old. The man was a serial killer and he was finally caught and imprisoned. Edward has tried very hard to forget him ever since and be his own person. Now, decades later he has a wife (Jody) and a young daughter (Sam) and a successful job (as an accountant). But a bank robbery turned bloody will bring cruel violence back into Edward’s life, affecting those he loves the most. Once again, the ugly question of whether or not Edward is like his father will be raised.I’m totally going to love on this book. I really enjoyed it, even more so than Cemetery Lake. Set in modern day Christchurch, New Zealand, Edward is a very interesting character and we get to see him during his worst hours. I really felt for the guy. First he has this horrible family history that’s full of tragedy. Then he has is own little demon to contend with, one he thought he had beaten down many years ago. Finally, he has the worst week of his life during the length of this book. He goes through quite the range of emotions.The author pulls in characters from the Theodore Tate novels, specifically Detective Schroeder. He’s cynical and sharp and married to doing the right thing (and doing it by the books as much as possible). In fact, the book opens with him and his guys looking into the death of a man in a trench coat and large suction cups. Yeah, I giggled too. Schroeder is quickly pulled off this case to attend to a bank robbery, the same one that Edward is caught in the middle of.After the robbery is all said and done, Edward feels he must find the bandits. His father, who is still in prison, gives him a call and asks him to visit. That really starts the slippery slope for Edward. What follows is a mix of righteous payback, a struggle against Edward’s baser desires, and Edward coming to terms with who he is (including his relationship with his father). Be prepared for a respectable body count on this one.Some animals suffer in this book. The author provides one clear, detailed example and then alludes to the others without giving specifics. These episodes are used sparingly and definitely add to the character’s dimension; these scenes aren’t here merely to up the horror level of the book.The story held my attention all the way through and I finished it in three days. The novel brings up questions of inner evil and what constitutes free will versus a mental illness. The main characters are well done. There’s some interesting twists that kept me guessing as to where the author would take the story.I won a copy of this book from The Audio Book Reviewer) with no strings attached.Narration: Paul Ansdell was a great voice for both Detective Schroeder and Edward Hunter. I liked his slightly gravelly voice for the older, jaded Schroeder. He did a great job of portraying Edward’s many emotions throughout the novel. His female voices were believable. I wonder, as I did with Cemetery Lake, why no New Zealand accents? Perhaps this was the publisher’s direction, but I don’t really know.
    • 2/5
      A heart-pumping but finally rather distasteful psychological thriller, in which a young father's world is turned upside-down after tragedy strikes his family and he finds himself tempted to follow the footsteps of his own estranged father, a convicted serial killer.
    • 5/5
      Blood Men by Paul Cleave was a page turner. This was a book that kept me guessing and once it got going it never really stopped. The story pulled me in and I emphasized with the characters. There were a few places where the I stopped and thought, "Nah that wouldn't have happened that way," but overall a great experience and fun book to read. Why do I mark it down a bit? Well, my gosh the book is depressing and never pulls itself out of that mode. Because I felt for the characters, it really depressed my mood even when I wasn't reading. But it is a rare book that can change my moods like that, so for that I recommend and want to check out more by Cleave.
    • 3/5
      New Zealand author Paul Cleave's newest book, sets itself up for something brilliant. The son of a serial killer, whose life was destroyed with his father's arrest, rebuilds and overcomes his father's notoriety to live a quiet life as an accountant, happily married, with a daughter. He and his wife are in a bank in downtown Christchurch in the middle of a sunny December day to see about qualifying for a mortgage, when the bank is robbed. And the action and reactions begin.The first half of this book is full of normal human reactions to horrific events. People are terrified, observers unable to take greater action than to use their phones to record the events unfolding and there are occasional and usually futile acts of bravery. Eddie is himself frozen and uncertain, both during the robbery and afterwards. He's conflicted and angry and very real. And then the book descends into a revenge fantasy bloodbath. Every so often, Eddie reflects for a moment, but he never really allows contemplation to halt his forward motion. Blood Men is a brutal read; during the first half it seemed to be leading somewhere revelatory, but in the second half, as the body count rose, it was merely gratuitous.
    • 5/5
      It always amazes me, how Paul Cleave can start out with a scenario that somehow seems quite normal and "expected" and then make it all go very very good weird, and you don't even notice that it's happening until you finish the book, turn all the lights back on the in house and take a big deep breath. And check the locks.I'm very very partial to Paul Cleave's books and BLOOD MEN was no exception. Noir doesn't really cut it when you're describing these books, they are dense, intrinsically, fundamentally dark books sure, but there's also always something slightly unexpected, something slight twisty, something just that little bit weird in what is going on that a reader really isn't allowed to get into a comfort zone. But BLOOD MEN is built around a scenario that couldn't possibly make you comfortable - the idea that a happily married family man, the son of a man of blood - a notorious serial killer never to be released. A son who has spent his life denying the father that he then must turn to for help. It somehow seems quite natural that with a family background like Edward's, he'd be worried about his destiny. Is he free of the worst of his father's legacy or is he, Edward, destined to be a man of blood also?Of course, in a scenario like this, there's going to be some graphic violence, but that's tempered somewhat by a cheeky, sly and clever sense of humour. Having said that the taut plotline and the way that the tension over Edward's future builds was more than enough to make this reader charge through the violence, desperate to get to the end. So desperate that this was a one sitting book. Which, as per usual, means I was reading it in the dark, early morning. Which lead, of course, to that turning on all the lights problem. Which leads to the lack of sleep that I've come to expect when reading a Paul Cleave book. There aren't many authors that make me change my daily routine, but Paul Cleave does it everytime and I can't wait for the next book.
    • 5/5
      I really enjoyed this book. Disturbing and graphic at times it took me by surprise and once it started moving, it really took off.