Blood Moon

Sandra Brown’s Blood Moon (2025) is a thriller that follows a television journalist and a disgraced detective as they pursue the truth in a seemingly solved crime and expose layers of corruption and lies. The novel unravels a cold case through shifting perspectives, moving from the protagonists to the perpetrator to the corrupt police chief attempting to cover up the truth. Blood Moon incorporates police procedural elements and psychological suspense, exploring themes such as The Lingering Effects of Trauma and the Search for Healing; Truth, Justice, and the Cost of Silence; and Moral Responsibility Versus Career Loyalty. Blood Moon highlights the importance of confronting the pernicious nature of hidden truths and the profound cost of silence.

This guide refers to the Kindle edition, published by Grand Central Publishing in 2025.

Content Warning: The source material and guide feature depictions of death, child death, death by suicide, ableism, child abuse, addiction, substance use, sexual content, and cursing.

Plot Summary

Blood Moon depicts the aftermath of a cold case, following disgraced detective John Bowie and television journalist Beth Collins as they unravel the cover-up and attempt to find the true perpetrator. Beth meets John in a seedy bar and tells him that she believes there’s a connection between Crissy Mellin’s disappearance and the blood moon. She believes that the killer will strike again. John is skeptical, believing that Beth is chasing a story for Crisis Point, a popular crime show. John doesn’t want to re-explore the case that ruined his career and his personal life. 

After Beth leaves the bar, John gets into a staged fight with his undercover former partner and best friend, Mitch Haskell. Later, Mitch visits him at his secluded home on the bayou and shares that his wife is pregnant and that he wants to leave the Drug Enforcement Administration. Beth calls her boss and mentor, Max Longren, who is being forced to retire due to health issues. Beth shares that John won’t get involved, and Max encourages her to come back to New York before his replacement, Winston Brady, realizes that she is investigating Crissy’s case without permission.

John’s boss, Tom Barker, warns John not to do any interviews before the Crisis Point episode about Crissy. He does not want John sharing his misgivings about the case. Barker gets angry when John points out that Crissy’s body was never found. John follows Beth to the airport and has Transportation and Security Administration (TSA) agents help him locate her. Beth tells him that there will be two blood moons this year and that the next one is in four days.

Barker learns that John intercepted Beth at the airport. He tells Frank Gray, a loyal detective, that he is done dealing with John.

John takes Beth to his secluded house, and she meets his dog, Mutt. Beth tells John that during a different blood moon, Larissa Whitmore went missing. Mutt growls, and John leads Beth to his shed. He sees Gray prowling around his house, and he takes Beth to his boat. John rows them to his fishing cabin, which is not registered under his name. Beth tells John about other women who disappeared during blood moons. John reiterates that he cannot get involved in the Crissy Mellin case again.

An unnamed man jogs, thinking about the upcoming blood moon. He remembers taking Crissy and how she fought him, which made it less satisfying. On the next blood moon, he wants to find a sacrifice who appreciates the honor.

John takes Beth to a hotel and kisses her. At work, John calls Detective Morris, the detective in charge of Larissa’s case. She shares that she tipped off Barker about the blood-moon connection. John realizes that the corruption runs deep. John punches Barker, promising to bring him down for his corruption. Barker fires John and takes his badge and weapon. John tells Beth that she must leave the hotel, and they return to his fishing cabin. Beth calls Max, who admits that he wanted her to pursue the blood-moon angle. He tells her to get him an Emmy.

John reaches out to the other detectives regarding the blood-moon disappearances. Beth shares that her sister died of a brain tumor at 16 and that her parents died by murder and death by suicide. John and Beth almost have sex, but John’s daughter, Molly, calls and interrupts. John meets Molly at a café before school the next day. Molly hates living with her mother, but John reminds Molly that she agreed not to run away again. Molly goes to school, and John learns that Barker issued a warrant for his arrest on assault charges.

Beth and John speak to Carla Mellin, Crissy’s mother. Carla angrily reiterates that Billy Oliver did not kill Crissy. She shares that Billy was dyslexic and that he could not have written a confession under duress. John calls Isabel Sanchez—the officer who discovered Billy’s body—and Sanchez nervously says that she cannot speak to John. Meanwhile, Beth reaches out to Dr. Victor Wallace to learn more about the goddess Luna and the significance of the blood moon. Later, Sanchez calls John and shares that Frank Gray threatened her. She agrees that Billy could not have written the confession because he did not have a writing utensil. Beth learns that Max has died, devastating her.

Barker instructs Gray to follow Molly. Beth cannot reach her new boss, Brady, but she learns that Brady moved the Crissy Mellin episode to the night of the blood moon. He added Max’s and Beth’s names as producers: Their reputations will be ruined when the factually incorrect episode airs. Barker tells Gray to snatch Molly; Gray is grateful that he started recording his calls with Barker.

Brady fires Beth for attempting to sabotage the upcoming episode. John’s ex-wife calls and tells John to bring Molly home, which confuses John since she’s not with him. He calls Barker, who claims that he has Molly. Barker tells John to meet him at John’s house. Mitch and John go to his house, where Barker and Gray are already waiting. Barker makes John toss his weapon, and Mitch creates a distraction in the back. John disarms Barker and knocks him out. Mitch ties Gray up and puts him in the shed, and Gray admits that they never had Molly. Meanwhile, Beth notices a tattoo gun in the background of her recorded Zoom meeting with Dr. Wallace. At the end of the interview, he reacts to Molly’s name.

Molly wakes up inside a shed with Wallace. Her head hurts, and she has a concussion. Mitch uses a device called a stingray to locate Wallace when Beth calls him. Mitch follows Wallace while John and Beth drive toward their location. John sees Wallace headed for a shed.

Molly is inside the shed. Wallace arrives, and John waits until he unlocks the padlock before knocking him down. John takes care of Molly while Mitch arrests Wallace. The police arrive with an ambulance, and a detective tells John that Gray was found dead in John’s shed; John’s service pistol was found nearby. John reminds the detective that his service pistol was taken by Barker. John goes to the hospital with Molly.

Brady is skeptical that Wallace is Crissy’s true killer and refuses to stop the episode. John suggests that Carla Mellin might rattle Wallace, so John and Beth visit her. Carla refuses to help, but Crissy reveals herself and offers to speak to him. She faked her death to escape Wallace’s abuse and has been in hiding ever since. At the police station, Beth calls her assistant, Richard, and tells him to get the episode canceled because Crissy is alive. Crissy confronts Wallace, and he accuses her of ruining his ritual and keeping him from getting admitted to the inner sanctum. While Wallace is arrested for abducting Molly, the fates of the other women who disappeared during blood moons remain unsolved, leaving the larger pattern of violence disturbingly unresolved.

John and Beth watch the blood moon. The next day, the network offers Brady’s job to Beth. John is upset that Beth is leaving, but he offers to take her to the airport.

Six months later, John and Beth meet at the bar where they met. Beth and John are attending Mitch’s son’s christening the next day. John got Barker’s job after Barker was imprisoned. Beth shares that she produced a new episode about Crissy’s case that she is proud of. She quit her job and is moving to Louisiana to do freelance editing. Beth tells John that she loves him and wants to be nearer to him, and John tells her that he loves her too.