Blood Shot

Vic is one of my favorite literary characters of all time. I adore her no nonsense toughness. She has been much criticized for her lack of humor, lack of friends, and her approach to life, which to me make her a unique character in the world of the fuzzy warm soft hearted female PIs. Vic takes nothing off of anybody, and I love her for it! Carry on Sara Paretsky...I hope Vic gets tougher and tougher and time goes by.

This was the first VI Warshawski book I ever read, and it did an excellent job of whetting my appetite for more. I think Paretsky did an excellent job of drawing me into VI's world, which is rich with unique characters. VI comes across as individualistic and principled, and I like how Paretsky resisted cliché temptation on several counts: the complex issue of chemical responsibility is not wrapped up in a tidy bundle by the end of the book, and there is no "obligatory sex scene." Not that sex scenes don't have their places, but I just hate it when I'm reading along and I can almost hear the agent say, "Okay, author, you need to steam this up a bit right here if you want to sell this book." In this story, VI is all business, which is a delightful change of pace.

"I would not be turned into a eunuch, be driven into living my life on the margins designed by someone else's will." What has worked for Paretsky in Toxic Shock is the simultaneous rejection or minimization of typical features of the hard-boiled genre and the explicit use of some essential elements of feminism. These changes are evident in characterisation, plot development, and ambience. Unlike the preferred male private dick of the genre, V.I. Warshawski of Toxic Shock is neither a loner nor a cynic . She forms strong emotional bonds, makes friends, worries about people toward whom she has no professional obligations. She also displays a wide range of emotional behaviour: notably, introspection, guilt, self awareness, and uncertainty. The result is that V.I. is a three dimensional figure karate chopping out of the page.Paretsky's foregrounding of gender also leads to an active questioning of patriarchist assumptions, the reader is urged by the text to solve not only the problem of the crime but also the problems of the male dominated social system. V.I. fights back against patriarcal hegemony like her life depends on it...and it ofetn does, "I stood over him panting with fury, my gun in my barrel-fist, ready to smash into him if he started to get up. His face was glazed - none of his womenfolk had ever fought back against him." But our heroine also finds time to party like there's no tomorrow, "I called up an old friend and spent a pleasant evening on Lincoln Avenue. The blister on my left heel didn't stop my dancing until past midnight."V.I. Warshawski - A Blood Shot in the arm for oppressed sisters everywhere!

Published in Australia under the title, Toxic Shock, this novel shows that Sara Paretsky is getting better every time she puts pen to paper. V. I. is forced to confront the past she thought she'd escaped when a cry for help from an old friend takes her back to Chicago's South Side. In an industrial wasteland of chemical plants and toxic swamps, she must unravel a mystery more than 30 years old, defeat a financial giant and take revenge for an outrageous crime against the people she grew up with, while reliving her memories of childhood. The truth is hard to find, and harder to believe, but with the unwitting aid of friends, old and new, she does deliver - as does Paretsky, whose writing is crisp and powerful, with multi-dimensional characters and a rivetting, unpredictable plot. A provocative and compelling mystery from the First Lady of Crime Fiction.

V.I. Warshawsky is a lady who has difficulty saying "no" to the grown-up little brat for whom she used to babysit. Her effort to find the woman's father leads unexpectedly to fine brandy, toxins, a new uncle, a cold marsh, and a wonderful lady who decides to start living at age 79. Paretsky's writing, always good, has really matured. If you have ever driven through Chicago's south side, or have a yen for a great mystery, read this book