Dead as a doornail

Dead as a Doornail is a novel by the American writer Charlaine Harris, published in 2005. It is the fifth book in The Southern Vampire Mysteries, which are narrated by the telepathic cocktail waitress Sookie Stackhouse.

The book begins with a family problem: Sookie's brother Jason is going through the first change into a were-panther, and she can see it happening before he can explain it. That worry becomes something worse when someone with a rifle begins shooting at the shape-changers of the area. The attacks put Jason in an impossible position, because the panthers he has just joined have no reason to trust a newcomer, and the shootings give them a very good reason to suspect one. Sookie, meanwhile, is dealing with the divisions among the local vampires and weres, with a house full of people who owe her favours and with the fact that being able to hear what everyone is thinking does not make it easier to know who is lying.

The series is set in a Louisiana where vampires and shape-changers have recently become public knowledge, and the books work through the practical consequences of that for a small town and for the humans who share it.