Blood Rites (The Dresden Files, Book 6)

by Jim Butcher

Book Overview

In this novel in the #1 New York Times bestselling Dresden Files, Chicago's only professional wizard takes on a case for a vampire and becomes the prime suspect in a series of ghastly murders. Harry... This description may be from another edition of this product.

• Format: Mass Market Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0451459873
• Release Date: August 2004
• Publisher: Ace
• Length: 372 Pages
• Weight: 0.30 lbs.
• Dimensions: 7.5" x 1.0" x 4.3"

Customer Reviews

Acceptable condition

This book came in alright. Not too bad of shape. Looks like there was some minor water damage, but nothing too bad.

Not in acceptable condition

Looked like it had been dipped in coffee. Unreadable

Another excellent addition to the series.

This is another great addition to the series. First off the beginning is freaking hilarious. This book also drops some bombshell revelations dealing with Harry's family history and you get to see another side of Murphy and her family as well. All in all this is another excellent book in the series that changes some things forever. I love the Dresden Files!

Ritual Death Magic

Blood Rites (2004) is the sixth urban fantasy novel in the Harry Dresden series, following Death Masks. In the previous volume, John Marcone grabbed the Shroud from Nicodemus and jumped off the train into the river. Michael Carpenter attacked Nicodemus and was overwhelming him, but then Nicodemus pulled a gun and shot Michael several times through his breastplate. Harry temporarily overcame Nicodemus and got Michael off the train. Marcone pulled Harry from the river with the Shroud. After that, Harry didn't remember anything until he woke up in Charity's guest room. Marcone still had the Shroud. By following the gang boss around the city, Harry finally learned why Marcone had commissioned the theft of the Shroud. In this novel, Harry is running hard down the abandoned school hallway with a box of puppies in his arms. The old school is on fire, but not because of him. Three monkey demons are chasing him, throwing gobs of flaming monkey poop at him and starting fires all along the corridors. One puppy keeps climbing up and barking at the monkey demons. Once Harry drops the box and the puppies fall out. Harry scoops them up and starts running again, but the little notched-ear pup has been left behind. As he stands growling at the monkeys, Harry turns back, gathers him up and starts running again. Finally he gets outside the building and runs toward the Blue Beetle. A larger version of the monkey demons bursts out of the doors. The other three monkeys ram the large demon and are absorbed, making the large demon become still larger. This entity spreads his wings and takes off, buzzing the Blue Beetle. Harry yells at Thomas to start the car, then dives in the passenger side and stuffs the box of puppies into the back. The flying monkey throws incendiaries at the Volkswagen. Thomas hangs onto Harry's leg as he hangs out the door and blasts the monkey. Then Harry has Thomas stop the car and blasts the demon right between the eyes. Scratch one demon, at least for a little while! Harry passes the box of puppies on to his client, but fails to notice the notch-eared pup under the seat. When he finds the pup, his client has already left for Tibet and is unavailable. Harry decides to keep the pup for a while until he can make some other arrangements. In this story, Thomas asks Harry to talk to an erotic film producer who seems to be suffering from a curse. Arturo is Greek and has three ex-wives. His female associates are dying in strange ways. Harry wonders if the man has been cursed with an entropy spell, but also considers an Evil Eye curse. He finally agrees to talk with Arturo. Harry reports to work the next day at the makeshift studio. As a production assistant, he is basically a gofer. At least he will be able to observe the crew and sense the curse first hand. That morning, Harry senses an evil magic rising near him and tracks it to a staff restroom. Another woman has been badly hurt and only saved from death by Harry

Amazing and fun series.................

I've been hooked on this series from book one Storm Front and there these books just got better and better. After re-reading Death Masks and finally excepting Harry and Susan's break-up that I took really hard, because I thought they were so good together. Harry finally finds out more about his family and secrets about his mother that he never knew. Things also heat up for Karin Murphy a detective and Harry. Also he gets to fight Vampires and finds out that he has a brother who I won't tell who he is. I enjoyed the flying Monkeys and his new family member, a dog? I highly recommend this series and I'm anxious for the next book in the series called Deadbeat. I also hope that Jim plans to bring Susan back she prove to be a valuable friend and allie to Harry in the future. Read this series,but start with book one because all his books build from his previous ones.

Keeping It in the Family

I'm not sure that it is technically accurate to label this latest stanza in the 'Dresden File' series a pleasant surprise, since all of the books have been enjoyable reading. But author Jim Butcher has managed to take a series that was showing signs of being pleasantly predictable and up the level just a bit. Much of this has been accomplished by developing Harry Dresden into something more than a Chicago wizard with an overly developed sense of responsibility (and possible an overactive thyroid). He has developed more of the sense of self-awareness I would expect from a professional wizard, although I would say that Harry's judgment is still has a bit of adolescent about it. Another part of this growth stems from the fleshing out of the basic Dresden plot, which is Harry in trouble with the wizard's White Council and hunted by the various vampire courts. That hasn't changed much. This time Harry is trying to put a stop to a new Black Court effort to end his life while keeping a deadly evil eye curse from bankrupting a porno film startup company. The latter effort puts Harry at odds with the head of the Vampire's White Court. We get to experience both the delights of the film stage and the wild action of a raid on a Black Court lair. Butcher makes this come alive by filling in a lot of the blanks about his vampire's society and politics, while stepping up the heat on Harry's relationship with Lt. Karrin Murphy, the head of Special Investigation. Throw in the development of several other collateral characters and you have an action story with interesting characters. This works well, because Butcher seems to know when to back off from the melodramatic and let people behave like people (or vampires) in a serious conflict.. Of course, the usual spookiness and ritual magic are there as always. Magic works in Butcher's alternate reality, and it sometimes works with a vengeance. The author sometimes takes a moment to explain how such things are supposed to work, but wisely, he avoids creating a formal system that would limit story development. Instead he blends magic, supernatural, and the occult as needed to get the right effect. I'm not a purist, and Butcher manages to avoid glaring self-contradiction. Keep in mind that this genre is beginning to get crowded with Harry Dresden's and Anita Blake's. Butcher's stories maintain a distinct identity and style that is beginning to be imitated, which is the best recommendation of all.

Best so far

This is the sixth book in the Dresden series. Harry Dresden is Chicago's only practicing wizard investigator and is listed in the yellow pages. He's young, single, and good-hearted. A vampire friend (there are three kinds of vampires, Red, White and Black Court) wants him to investigate a case for him. A movie producer is being cursed, and the women around him keep on dying in strange ways. As usual, Harry jumps right in, is chivalrous and heroic to the end, and there's plenty of action on every page. Demons, puppies, vampires, police, mysterious assassins, wizards, succubi, it's all there. However, this book was different from the previous five because at the end of the book, Harry and his life had changed forever. This series used to be frustrating to read because each book would end with very little changed about the character or his circumstances, like a sit-com. But with this latest installment, there was more heart, non-stop action as usual, and new relationships being formed, so that it was more like an exciting installment of a dramatic series. Butcher writes very well, there's no mad clap farcical world (Terry Prachett or Christopher Moore) or weird angst - Harry's just a regular guy with bad luck days - just that his bad lucks tend to include demon assassins, homocidal succubi...

More Harry situations...

Wowsers. Mr. Butcher just keeps raising the bar in this series. I found this book to be the most rewarding and tightly-plotted of the Dresden books so far. Lots of questions are answered, while dangling plot threads from two and three books ago are woven back in. And yet, the more that's revealed about Harry's world (and his place in it), the more mysteries arise. One particularly interesting and insightful bit (especially in a "fantasy" novel with vampires, magic and whatnot) is the commentary on the porno industry and its shaping of human expectations of sexual behavior and relationships for malevolent purpose. Some of the earlier books might be merely "fun reads," but this one tackles some issues that are worth talking about, and does so intelligently. And it does so in a, well, fun read. Not to mention the characters' growth! Sheesh! Six books of Harry and Murphy, and we're still just scratching the surface. Well, we're a little deeper than the epidermis at this point (might actually be drawing blood, if you'll forgive the analogy), but you get the sense that there's still a long way to go yet before we really get to the meat...