In the Press
Video: A Blood Thing
A video list of ten “edge of your seat” thrillers. (A BLOOD THING starts around the 3:34 mark).
Click on image to play video
"The governor is left with no choice but to comply with the blackmailer's demands through the mysterious phone."
Coming in at #8, is "A Blood Thing" by James Hankins. Andrew Kane, the governor of Vermont, is at a meet-and-greet when someone discreetly hands him a cell phone and whispers to keep it a secret, as he will need it after the arrest. Within a matter of hours, his brother Tyler gets framed and arrested for the murder of a young woman. The governor is left with no choice but to comply with the blackmailer's demands through the mysterious phone. He must quickly figure out a way to escape the threats and save his brother.
"James Hankins is the USA Today bestselling author of numerous thrillers, mysteries, and suspense novels, including The Inside Dark, and The Prettiest One. He lives with his wife and sons near Boston. His latest novel is A Blood Thing.
By Peiasantiago & Ezvid Wiki Editorial
If you love enthralling mysteries, frightening criminals, and psychological thrills, then the titles gathered here belong on your bookshelf. These thrillers are full of surprising twists and turns that will keep you on the edge of your seat from start to finish. This video was made with Ezvid Wikimaker.
By: Cynthianna Matthews
“With great pacing, suspense and believable characters, A Blood Thing is a masterpiece of murder-mystery writing....”
Wealth, power and prestige: The Kane family of Vermont has them all. Andrew Kane is in his thirties, the youngest person to be elected governor of Vermont. With a sterling reputation for honesty and incorruptibility, he’s on track to the White House. Fate intervenes when a stranger at an opening ceremony hands him a cell phone with instructions to answer it when an arrest is made. Andrew puts the incident down to a crank having fun at his expense. He changes his mind quickly when his brother Tyler is arrested for murder.
"James Hankins is the USA Today bestselling author of numerous thrillers, mysteries, and suspense novels, including The Inside Dark, and The Prettiest One. He lives with his wife and sons near Boston. His latest novel is A Blood Thing.
“A BLOOD THING” BY JAMES HANKINS
By: Jason Scott
“A Blood Thing will keep you on the edge of your seat, as it plunges you into a world of family secrets, cold-blooded murder, and political maneuvering.”
Wealth, power and prestige: The Kane family of Vermont has them all. Andrew Kane is in his thirties, the youngest person to be elected governor of Vermont. With a sterling reputation for honesty and incorruptibility, he’s on track to the White House. Fate intervenes when a stranger at an opening ceremony hands him a cell phone with instructions to answer it when an arrest is made. Andrew puts the incident down to a crank having fun at his expense. He changes his mind quickly when his brother Tyler is arrested for murder.
By: James Hankins
Without a shred of evidence to back up this claim, I would venture to say that a great many crime novels—perhaps even the majority of them—contain at least some element of family, whether a family’s dramatic conflict plays a central role in the book, or whether, by contrast, family plays a smaller but still vital role in the story. Often, the actions of a character in a crime novel are driven by love for a family member, as in stories in which the protagonist is fighting to protect a loved one, or prove the innocence of one, or is searching for one that is missing or has been kidnapped. Conversely, a story might involve a darker side of familial relations, one in which characters abuse, blackmail, betray, or even murder each other. Whatever the story, whatever the crime, there is a good chance that family plays a part in the novel.
"James Hankins is the USA Today bestselling author of numerous thrillers, mysteries, and suspense novels, including The Inside Dark, and The Prettiest One. He lives with his wife and sons near Boston. His latest novel is A Blood Thing.
A Blood Thing Audiobook Narrated by Timothy Andrés Pabon
By: Literati Literature Lovers Blog/Robbielea in Book Reviews
Listen to a clip above.
The theme of A Blood Thing is how far will someone go to help a family member? How important are one's principles when standing firm will mean the incarceration of a brother who has special needs? Is there ever a time when doing the wrong thing is the only thing that’s right? A Blood Thing is an engrossing tale of family guilt and loyalty and features one of the most chilling psychos I’ve encountered recently. I think readers and listeners will be fascinated by the complex schemes Wyatt Pickman devises in order to carry out his “job.” James Hankins has created a character who has no redeeming qualities.
This is my first experience with narrator Timothy Andrés Pabon. His performance is just what is needed to make the story even more disturbing. His voice for Tyler makes him so sweet and sympathetic and his voice for the blackmailer will make your flesh crawl.
“A Blood Thing is an engrossing tale of family guilt and loyalty and features one of the most chilling psychos I’ve encountered recently.”—Literati Literature Lovers
By: Marshal Zeringue
James Hankins writes thrillers, mysteries, and novels of suspense, including The Inside Dark, The Prettiest One, Shady Cross, Brothers and Bones, Drawn, and Jack of Spades. He lives north of Boston with his wife and sons.
Hankins applied the Page 69 Test to A Blood Thing, his seventh novel, and reported the following:
My latest suspense novel, A BLOOD THING, is many things—political thriller, police procedural, crime novel, and family drama to name a few—but what sets the story into motion is a complex plot hatched and executed by a twisted, cunning blackmailer who has spent more than a year planning his scheme. His target is a powerful Vermont family of siblings. Read More
"It’s fitting for purposes of this exercise that the blackmailer’s wall, so central to his plan and to the story itself, appears on page 69. It’s so important to A Blood Thing, in fact, that the cover of the book—on which appear words on paper, and photographs, and yarn, all held in place by thumbtacks—was designed to mimic the wall."
They would ask me what actors I saw in the roles. I would tell them, and they’d say “Oh that’s interesting.” And that would be the end of it. —Elmore Leonard, in 2000, on the extent of his input for Hollywood's adaptation of his novels.
By: Marshal Zeringue
James Hankins writes thrillers, mysteries, and novels of suspense, including The Inside Dark, The Prettiest One, Shady Cross, Brothers and Bones, Drawn, and Jack of Spades. He lives north of Boston with his wife and sons.
Here Hankins dreamcasts an adaptation of his new suspense novel, A Blood Thing:
A Blood Thing is a crime thriller about a powerful family targeted by a twisted, cunning blackmailer. The importance of family and the lengths to which we go to protect our loved ones is the central theme of the book, so if it were made into a movie, the casting of the actors who would play the family members would be critical to bringing that theme to life on the screen. Read More
By: Jon Land / Special to The Journal
James Hankins’ chillingly effective “A Blood Thing” (Thomas & Mercer, $24.95, 455 pages) also makes use of New England settings, Vermont in this case.
Reminiscent of Harlan Coben for all the right reasons, Hankins’ latest treats us to classic noir that dredges up the genre staples of extortion and manipulation layered amid hero Andrew Kane’s quest for the light in the form of saving his brother from a murder charge. The descent he must first make deeper into the darkness takes him into a netherworld of ambiguous morality, posing the question of how far would you go to save someone you loved?
Unique in its approach and bracing in its execution, “A Blood Thing” bleeds terrific reading entertainment on every page.
By: Grady Harp
Massachusetts author James Hankins is not only a movie star handsome man he is also a highly successful and honored writer. In addition to these skills he has been active as a lawyer (receiving his degree from University of Connecticut School of Law), was in health administration and embraced screenwriting. Attending NYU's Tisch School of the Arts, he received the Chris Columbus Screenwriting Award. His six (to date) published books - SHADY CROSS, BROTHERS AND BONES, JACK OF SPADES, DRAWN and THE PRETTIEST ONE have been popular with the public and critics alike: now he adds A BLOOD THING.
As James states, `I write novels. They're all thrillers, with elements of other genres as well -- mystery, suspense, police procedural, paranormal/supernatural. I try to write books that make you want to read one more page before turning out the light . . . and then another, and, well, maybe just one more . . . ` James lives with his wife and twin sons just north of Boston.
"Defining what makes James' writing so fine is a tough task - reading him is a better approach than critiquing him. But A Blood Thing is such a perfect craft that it may be his best novel yet. Highly Recommended."
—Grady Harp
Open Letters Review
AN ARTS & LITERATURE REVIEW
By: Steve Donoghue
Veteran thriller-writer James Hankins has a knack for taking the most staid, even derivative plots of the genre and infusing them with an energy and readability that time and again saves his books from feeling like they were written by a computer program. This is certainly true for his latest from Thomas & Mercer (the thriller-lit arm of Amazon publishing), A Blood Thing, which turns on that reliable old chestnut, the blackmail scheme.
"[S]uperbly confident novel of suspense, one with an enjoyably tricky final act. And if Hankins has done his job, readers finishing the book will jump the next time their phone rings."
Steve Donoghue was a founding editor of Open Letters Monthly. His book criticism has appeared in the Boston Globe, the Wall Street Journal, and the American Conservative. More @ SteveDonoghue.com
By: Debbie Maldrum
A Blood Thing by James Hankins is a suspenseful thriller that puts a family on the edge of ruin and explores how far siblings will go to protect each other.
Back in the 1950s, television families were almost always depicted as close and loving. Oh, there might be the occasional sibling squabble, but one or both parents would take the kids aside and get them to work everything out. One big happy family again. Then, that flipped. Siblings didn’t just squabble. They schemed, fought, and tried to destroy each other—if not physically, then professionally, romantically, or financially.
A Blood Thing is about four siblings who would do anything for each other. The eldest brother is the governor of Vermont. The second brother works for the Vermont State Patrol. The only sister, Molly, served in the army. Tyler, Molly’s twin, is the sweetest 29-year-old man you could meet.
But this is no saccharine 1950s ideal family. For one thing, Tyler has a traumatic brain injury, which he suffered at a young age. He now has the mental capacity of an 11-year-old. Read More
"James Hankins doles out family secrets and the fixer’s motivations and methods at exactly the right pace. Just as I thought I could set the book down, another twist grabbed me and kept me reading on. I love it when a book makes me think about it long after I reach the end, and A Blood Thing certainly does that."
Full coverage of all your favorite thriller authors, and their characters, unlike anywhere else on the web!
Andrew Kane is used to busy, chaotic days — that’s just part of life when you’re the sitting governor of the great state of Vermont. With the grand opening of a new senior citizen center on the docket, Cross heads out for a public meet and greet, which starts off normal enough until a stranger slips him a cell phone before whispering, “Keep that phone with you at all times, Governor. And keep it secret. You’re going to need it after the arrest.”
“Hankins’ latest offering is big on suspense...[H]e does a fine job developing his cast as the story unfolds, and the plots many moving parts are all brought together and tied up nicely with a nail-biting final act...A Blood Thing is the type of page-turner that you’ll want to tell everyone you know about as soon as you turn the final page.”—The Real Book Spy
Author James Hankins, outside of his Swampscott home. | Photo: Paula Muller
Writing His Next Chapter
By Rich Fahey
When it came time to lay down the law, James Hankins was happy to do it.
It proved to be a wise choice.
Now Hankins, a Swampscott resident, is a best-selling author who has a deal with a major publisher and a new novel — “The Inside Dark” — set to debut in July.
Have you ever wondered what would you have done if abducted by a serial killer?
Would have succumbed to your fate or would you have fought for your life?
The Inside Dark by James Hankins is a fast-paced, deftly written, suspenseful, psychologically rich, taut, and riveting novel.
The story, set in Boston area, is written in various points of view and you find yourself, from the very first page, into a started story.
"The Inside Dark by James Hankins is a fast-paced, deftly written, suspenseful, psychologically rich, taut, and riveting novel."—Haru