Blood Mud

{{Short description|Crime novel by K. C. Constantine}}

{{more citations needed|date=October 2019}}

{{Use mdy dates|date=March 2025}}

{{Infobox book |

| name = Blood Mud

| title_orig =

| translator =

| image = Blood Mud.jpg

| caption =

| author = K. C. Constantine

| cover_artist =

| country = United States

| language = English

| series =

| genre =

| publisher = The Mysterious Press of Warner Books

| release_date = 1999

| media_type = Print (hardback)

| pages = 375

| isbn = 0-89296-647-5

| oclc = 39458968

| preceded_by = Brushback

| followed_by = Grievance

}}

Blood Mud{{Cite web|url=https://www.goodreads.com/work/best_book/1087644-blood-mud|title=Blood Mud|website=www.goodreads.com|access-date=2019-04-13}} is a crime novel by the American writer K. C. Constantine set in 1990s{{Cite web|url=https://www.bookseriesinorder.com/k-c-constantine/|title=K.C. Constantine|date=2017-10-09|website=Book Series in Order|access-date=2019-04-13}} Rocksburg, a fictional, blue-collar, Rust Belt town in Western Pennsylvania, modeled on the author's hometown of McKees Rocks, Pennsylvania, adjacent to Pittsburgh.{{Cite web|url=https://www.publishersweekly.com/978-0-89296-647-9|title=Fiction Book Review: Blood Mud by K. C. Constantine, Author Mysterious Press $23 (375p) ISBN 978-0-89296-647-9|website=PublishersWeekly.com|date=April 1999 |language=en|access-date=2019-04-09}}

Mario Balzic is the protagonist, an atypical detective for the genre, a Serbo-Italian American cop, unpretentious, a family man who asks questions and uses more sense than force.{{Cite web|url=https://www.strandbooks.com/fiction/blood-mud-a-mario-balzac-novel|title=Blood Mud (A Mario Balzac Novel) in Fiction Fiction at Strand Books|website=www.strandbooks.com|access-date=2019-04-11}}

The novel opens with Balzic again being lured out of his retirement with an offer: track down the missing guns from a local gun shop for an insurance company.{{Cite web|url=https://www.publishersweekly.com/978-0-89296-647-9|website=www.publishersweekly.com|access-date=2019-04-11|title=Fiction Book Review: Blood Mud by K. C. Constantine |date=April 1999 }}

It is the fifteenth book in the 17-volume Rocksburg series.{{Cite web|url=https://www.fantasticfiction.com/c/k-c-constantine/blood-mud.htm|title=Blood Mud (Rocksburg, book 15) by K C Constantine|website=www.fantasticfiction.com|access-date=2019-04-09}}