Dead as a Doornail

💬: "Just when I thought I was used to them, vampires would show me their true face, and I would have to remind myself all over again that they were a different race. Or maybe it was centuries of conditioning that made the difference; decades of disposing of people as they chose, taking what they wanted, enduring the dichotomy of being the most powerful beings on earth in the darkness, and yet completely helpless and vulnerable during the hours of light."

Harris, Charlaine. Dead as a Doornail (Sookie Stackhouse Book 5) (p. 226). Penguin Publishing Group. Kindle Edition.

📖Genres: adult, paranormal, paranormal romance, vampires, shifters, werewolves, urban fantasy, mystery

📚Page Count: 293

🎧Audiobook Length: 10h 03min

👩🏾‍🏫My Rating: ⭐️⭐️⭐️ 2.75/5

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TW - <spoiler>Alcohol, Death, Murder, Gore, Animal cruelty, Grief, Car accident, Hate crime, Death of parent, Fire/Fire injury, Gun violence, Kidnapping, Injury/Injury detail, Violence, Body horror, Cursing, Animal death, Blood, and Stalking</spoiler>

Dead as a Doornail by Charlaine Harris is the 5th book in the Sookie Stackhouse Vampire Mystery series. In this installment of the series Sookie's brother, Jason, is suspected of being a sniper in the area that's targeting the were and changeling people. Sookie takes it upon herself to try and find out who the shooter is, to clear her brother's name, and to avenge some acquaintances who were killed by the sniper. There is more abuse from Bill in this novel, there's victim blaming, and there's a predictable mystery. Other than these issues, the story was okay.

TW -<spoiler>rape, sexual assault</spoiler>

There's a scene in here where Bill hurts Sookie again, and afterwards the <spoiler>sexual assault or rape that was perpetrated onto Sookie by Bill (in book 3) was finally address and brought up by Alcied. All Alcied says about the situation though is that Sookie was assaulted by Bill and that he personally doesn't like Bill. Sookie then contemplates about what makes her different from other sexual assault victims. She decides that she's no different from other victims but she excuses Bill's behavior by saying he was taken over by bloodlust and that he wouldn't have hurt her otherwise. </spoiler> Bill ends up grabbing and bruising Sookie's arm because he's too busy fighting with <spoiler>Sam to rein himself in.</spoiler> He apologizes and leaves and we see him only one other time and in this novel and that's perfect for me because bill is a jerk.

A friend of Sookie's, Tera, get's herself involved with a dangerous vampire. This vampire lured in and took advantage of Tera and after Tera has been beatin' and sexually assaulted by this vampire and his friends, Sookie victim blames Tera. <spoiler>Sookie reads Tera's mind to find out that Tera only liked the lavish gifts that the vampire gave her, and Sookie basically says Tera was hanging around the bad vampire for bad reasons so the abuse is Tera's fault or to be expected. Yeah, screw that message.</spoiler>

There are (spoilers about the ending) <spoiler>two reveals at the ending and one of them is predictable and the other one is not as predictable.</spoiler> The surprises in this story didn't make up for Sookie victim blaming Tera though.

I guess overall this was okay but there were certain parts I didn't like, like the ones with Bill or the ones where Sookie gets hurt. It seems someone is trying to <spoiler>hurt her every book at this point.</spoiler> I'm going to give it a 2.75 out of 5.

⭐️⭐️⭐️

I listened to this for free on the library app [Libbyapp.com]