Blood Bath: Seven Jack Nightingale Short Stories

Jack Nightingale #4.5

by Stephen Leather, Matt Hilton, Alex Shaw

Supernatural detective Jack Nightingale is called in to investigate a series of bloody deaths in a struggling hotel. Blood Bath is a short story written by bestselling author Stephen Leather, accompanied by six more short stories written by fans inspired by the cover and title.

Jack Nightingale features in more than a dozen novels, starting with Nightfall.

Genres: Horror, Short Stories, Thriller, Paranormal, Supernatural, Ebooks, Crime

207 pages, Kindle Edition

First published April 25, 2014

About the author

Stephen Leather was a journalist for more than ten years on newspapers such as The Times, the Daily Mail and the South China Morning Post in Hong Kong. His bestsellers have been translated into more than ten languages. He has also written for television shows such as London's Burning, The Knock and the BBC's Murder in Mind series. For much of 2011 his self-published eBooks - including The Bestseller, The Basement, Once Bitten and Dreamer's Cat - dominated the UK eBook bestseller lists and sold more than half a million copies. The Basement topped the Kindle charts in the UK and the US, and in total he has sold more than two million eBooks. His bestselling book The Chinaman was filmed as The Foreigner, starring Jackie Chan and Pierce Brosnan and grossing more than $100 million.

Reviews

[Gary · Rating 3 out of 5]

I am a great admirer of Stephen Leather and generally enjoy his work but I found this short story fairly average. I was gripped at the beginning but unfortunately I felt it fell away a little later on and it failed to keep me enticed to the very end.
I have read and enjoyed too many excellent books by this author to be put off and will continue to read more of Stephen Leather's work.

[Robert Waterman · Rating 5 out of 5]

Thoroughly enjoyed reading the different authors takes on Nightingale and the title.

[Marie · Rating 4 out of 5]

I have never read anything by this author before, so I thought I would give him a try and I was glad that I did. You have a detective by the name of Jack Nightengale who investigates weird and unusual problems of his clients. The author weaves a little bit of humor into the story. This book is a collection of 6 short stories written by other authors with the same title "Blood Bath" using the detective Jack Nightengale in their stories. This book was mysteriously creepy and I enjoyed reading it.

I liked the story so much that I have downloaded other books by Stephen Leather to my kindle as I am looking forward to reading more books by this author.

[Sam · Rating 3 out of 5]

Admittedly I haven't read any of the Jack Nightingale books at all so I don't know the characters or their background but despite that this was an amusing and interesting read. Leather has written the first story while the remaining 6 are written by fans, both professional and amateur writers, although they are all based around the same characters. The first story for me was the most gripping and had some Overlook/Shining overtones with the concept of a haunted hotel. Don't get me wrong though, the other stories were good too but I think having the same characters written by different people makes for unfair comparisons, especially when they are together in a collection like this.

[Michelle · Rating 4 out of 5]

I adore Stephen Leather's Jack Nightingale books and I own them all in either book/kindle format. The first Blood Bath was indeed written by Stephen but the other Blood Baths were written by other authors but they all involved Jack and Jenny and some involved Carmichael and Persperine and her collie too

[James · Rating 4 out of 5]

Interesting to read other authors take on Jack Nightingale. The challenge to use existing characters and tie the story in toone title Blood Bath. On the whole the quality was excellent, my favourite being Matt Hilton's contribution.

[Cheryl · Rating 3 out of 5]

This was an eerie, little short story featuring the author's paranormal detective, Jack Nightingale.
The premise of the tale was built around the book cover which the author already had, and as a bonus the author has included half a dozen other short stories written by fans (authors and others) using the same reference point.
I didn't read the other stories as they didn't hold my interest so this review only includes Stephen Leather's contribution. I've read other books in the Jack Nightingale series and unfortunately I feel this short story falls a bit from the mark, not having the same tension and excitement the other books had.
An enjoyable break read nonetheless but not the author's best work.

[Nathan Flamank · Rating 4 out of 5]

Apart from an ending that felt rushed and numerous spelling mistakes (poor proof reading me thinks) this is a thoroughly enjoyable read that adds to the world of Jack Nightingale...just a shame about the sudden ending.

[Sarah Baines · Rating 4 out of 5]

I admit i only read the Stephen Leather story in this volume. (I may read the others at a later date) the story itself was a great one however, there were so many typos it was untrue. Words missing etc but the one that irked me the most was that on numerous occasions Nightingale was called Shepherd. I can only assume Mr Leather got confused between his characters - Jack Nightingale and Spider Shepherd. It was very offputting that in the space of a single paragraph, I got Nightingale then Shepherd then Nightingale again. Sadly it happened repeatedly and spoiled the story somewhat for me.

[Jackthedad · Rating 3 out of 5]

It's an interesting concept, several short stories by different authors with the same title about the same character. Stephen Leather's is the best (of course). Two are good. The rest are poor or rubbish.

[Izabela · Rating 3 out of 5]

Only the first short in this collection is written by Stephen Leather, though they all feature his Jack Nightingale characters. Some of the writers are better than others, so my rating is based on the overall quality of the book, rather than my profound love for Leather's Nightingale universe.

[Shiraz Esat · Rating 3 out of 5]

It's always tricky reviewing an anthology, especially when the quality of work varies so much - I think there's one excellent story in there, a couple of interesting stories, and some real dire rubbish.

[The Endless Unread · Rating 3 out of 5]

An okay collection of stories

[Lisa-Jaine · Rating 3 out of 5]

Eerie little story which sadly ended too soon .

[Gayle · Rating 3 out of 5]

Nightingale and his helper Jenny are supernatural detectives. They assist people with normal and other worldly problems. Sense of humor is needed!
Seven stories seven authors but the same main protagonist!

[Nick Brett · Rating 5 out of 5]

Once again Stephen Leather manages to surprise his fans. For those of us traumatised by the events of the last novel we are now showered with gifts. Gift 1) a new novella by the author, 2) six additional stories written by fellow authors or fans, 3) astonishingly it is free. Free. My Gob is smacked.

How could this be anything less than 5 stars, top author provides free content and gets fellow authors to join in the fun. Bloody hell.

All the stories run with the Blood Bath theme some are more literal than others but all the usual ingrediants are there, Jenny, the MG, corona beers, smoking and some very bad stuff from the other side. Of course Mr Leather knows his character inside out and on one or two occasions the other authors try to tick all the expected boxes a little too much, but all in all this is great fun. Partly to have a bit more of Jack but also to see how other writers play with the character.

If you are a fan of jack Nightingale (and if not, why not?) then this is an absolute no-brainer. Download it instantly.

[Joan · Rating 1 out of 5]

Its very difficult to review a collection of short stories, particularly as they are written, by different authors, about the same character. I liked the idea very much - short stories all with the same title, (Blood Bath) and featuring Stephen Leather's 'Jack Nightingale'.

The first story, by Stephen Leather himself was crisp, interesting and without flaws, but this was not the case with several other stories, notably the one by Lynette Waterman, which was riddled with stupid spelling mistakes and far too many punctuation errors as well as some incredibly clunky dialogue. This was not the only story that needed a good editor, but it was the main culprit.

I probably won't read these 'shorts' again. The 'fan-fic' stories themselves were not sufficiently well-written to let me 'gloss over' the errors, so I am rating the whole collection as 1 star. Yes, the first was good, but to be honest, the rest of the stories dragged it down with them.

(4 stars for Stephen Leather's Blood Bath though.)

[Caragh · Rating 1 out of 5]

Stephen Leather's story was good, but the rest were just bad.

Embarassingly bad in some cases (most notably the second story by Alex Shaw - I almost abandoned the whole collection at that point, and to be honest, am still sorry that i didn't; and the fifth story by Lynnette Waterman which aside from being badly written was utter twaddle.)

The other four stories were mostly readable, but sadly, that's the best you can say for them. I'm very disappointed as the idea - a group of stories written in homage to Leather's Nightingale books by different authors from the same title/theme - could have been a really interesting book. But the quality of the authors chosen just did not measure up. The plots were bad, laughably so in one case, the writing was terrible, and the characterisation... calling him 'Jack', drinking Corona, and driving a MGB do not a character make. Characterisations of Jenny were as bad, if not worse.

Absolutely not worth the time, never mind the money. It cost too much at 'free'.

[Mari-Elaine · Rating 3 out of 5]

I've only given 3 stars for this book which may be a bit harsh but whilst I enjoyed Stephen's short story as it was true to his usual high standard I can't say the same for the rest of the fan fic versions.
The first couple of alternative versions were ok but once I got to the one by Lynette Waterman (which I found painfully bad) things went downhill from there.
I appreciate that other writers have varying styles but that wasn't what spoilt it for me - it was the clunky text, bad plots, constant mentions of Corona, MG & cigarettes as if that would make the character of Jack Nightingale credible, the same with Jenny also applied.
I felt that some of the other writers (the last 3 ) hadn't actually read the Nightingale books but just scanned one & didn't grasp the character of Jack or the relationship he has with Jenny or even Persperine.
Could have been an interesting take but for me it just presses home the calibre of Leather's books & why I enjoy them so much.

[Karen Green · Rating 3 out of 5]

An ok read, it didn't really draw me in but kept my interest enough to not DNF it.

[Hemant Jain · Rating 3 out of 5]

A detective dealing in the Paranormal .... interesting.

I haven't really been reading this genre but then while reading the short stories by Stephen Leather, I came across this intriguing character.

Blood Bath is in interesting in the sense that Stephen created a short story and then fan's have taken the name, the cover-page imagery and the central characters to build stories of their own.

It was interesting to read Stephen's version and then 6 more stories revolving around the 'Blood Bath' ...

its a nice read if you are inclined to the paranormal.

[Gillian · Rating 2 out of 5]

Not my normal genre for reading, first of all. The first short story by Stephen Leather is well written. The other stories are written for the same characters with the same title, written by fans of the series. As such there are a variety of abilities and styles. The last two are probably most like Leather's style, although the last has a distinct lack of "tension" - perhaps it needed to be longer as well. A few are particularly badly written: too much repetition, run ons, contradictions, etc.

[Christine bonner · Rating 5 out of 5]

This book is about Jack Nightingale and is done in short stories the first is by Stephen Leather the rest are from fans some of them are authors so you get to know what their are like and how they write. each story is about a bath that is full of blood and every story has Jack and is hard working assistant Jenny each one also has demons in it. Jack who's soul was sold to the devil get all the weird cases I love reading these books

[Allen · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is a series of 7 short stories based on the same characters (fanfic?). They are all horror stories and well done but most of them need proofing and I am not talking about the British spellings either.

[Naveen Mandadhi · Rating 5 out of 5]

One of the enjoyable novels by Stephen!!!! The ending was kind of hurried. But, indeed a griping short story. I've read all of Jack Nightingale's series and I liked this one same as I liked the rest of his books.

[Elizabeth · Rating 3 out of 5]

Really enjoyed the different authors and their stories. Supernatural twist so engrossing and authors story telling kept me on the Edgar of some, some endings are also not your your usual happy endings

[Ray Melville · Rating 4 out of 5]

Interesting collection of supernatural short stories by various authors, all featuring Jack Nightingale, investigating a Blood Bath. Same subject in each story but a different plot and 'take' on each.

[Michael Elliott · Rating 4 out of 5]

Nice and creepy

I've never read any of the Jack Nightingale series, so this short story was a great introduction. I loved the banter between Jack and his assistant Jenny which was nicely balanced with the world horror. The fan fiction Nightingale stories were a nice bonus.

[Susan Lee Thuener · Rating 5 out of 5]

5 short stories of the same character by different authors.

I liked this series of short stories. I thought even though the authors varied they maintained the Nightingale character very well.

[Hannah · Rating 5 out of 5]

awesome as usual, and great new talent to look out for