Dreadful

Dreadful by Caitlin Rozakis, 349 pages

When dark wizard Gavrax wakes up in his workshop at the beginning of this book, all he knows is that something went wrong with a magical working, as nothing else — not his name, where he is, what's going on, anything — can be found in his memory. After a bit of fumbling about the castle (hey, he has a castle!), he learns that he recently kidnapped a princess for a dark magic working with three other wizards, though he naturally has no clue as to the purpose of the upcoming event. Also, he's not so sure he really wants to be as evil as he apparently was before the memory-wiping disaster, and this might be a good time to turn over a new leaf, morality-wise.

This is an enjoyable book that pokes fun at dark wizard stereotypes, toxic masculinity, and even the hero tropes of fantasy. For a debut novel, it's lovely, and I look forward to seeing what else Rozakis has to offer in the future.

Saint Death's Daughter

Saint Death's Daughter by C.S.E. Cooney, 477 pages

Miscellaneous Stones (Lanie) is the youngest member of the Stones family, which has long served Liriat's ruling family as executioners and assassins. Lanie, however, has an allergy to any sort of unnatural physical harm, as sympathy wounds appear on her any time she's near someone getting stabbed, poisoned, beaten senseless with fists, etc. Makes it a bit hard for her to spend any time with her family (which makes Wednesday Adams seem like a cuddly lovable puppy), and to her psychopathic sister Nita, Lanie is an excellent target for bullying. Thankfully, Lanie is also a necromancer, so she's able to spend her time instead with ghosts, revenants (like the Stones family's longtime servant, Goody), and all the skeleton creatures she can animate. But when Nita comes home from schooling abroad with a shapeshifting man in her thrall and a royal assignment to murder the wizards of a rival country, Lanie finds herself spending more time than she'd like with Nita, Nita's now-husband Mak, and her niece Datura, constantly fearful that Nita's work and violent inclinations will bring on Lanie's demise and the destruction of everything their family built.

This was an enjoyable read, though my summary above only really hits on a small bit of the plot. A blurb on the back notes "every time I thought I knew what kind of book it was, it changed," and really, I couldn't agree more. Cooney obviously had a lot of really excellent ideas for worldbuilding and characters, but at times, I felt like this could have been expanded into a few books that gave more insight into those characters and places instead of cramming them all into one place. It's particularly perplexing, as this is intended to be a series, so some of those elements certainly could have waited until later on. That said, I loved the idea of a gentle, bookish, vegetarian necromancer, as well as so many of the other characters. Unsure about whether I'll read more though, given Cooney's love of footnotes (which slowed down the reading a LOT).

(P.S. Just learned that this won the 2023 World Fantasy Award for best novel. Clearly, my misgivings are my own.)

Midnight Riot

 

Midnight Riot (Rivers of London Series #1) by Ben Aaronovitch 384 pp.

I just discovered this series which has been around for more than a decade. I will definitely be reading more of them. It all begins when a man trips over a headless body in front of a church in London's Covent Garden. Probationary police officer Peter Grant takes a witness statement from what turns out to be a ghost. Soon Grant has been assigned to work with Chief Inspector Nightingale, the last wizard in Britain. Grant becomes Nightingale's apprentice wizard and has to deal with more ghosts, vampires, the warring God and Goddess of the River Thames and an assortment of supernatural events and creatures which lead to a riot at the the opera house at Covent Garden. After Nightingale is injured and Grant's fellow officer/girlfriend is possessed it falls on the apprentice wizard to track down and eliminate the cause. The plot is great, the characters are interesting, and the action is fast moving. I listened to the audiobook and the narrator, Kobna Holdbrook-Smith, does a great job. During the heavy action he even reads it in a breathless way which adds much to the story. 

A Wizard's Guide to Defensive Baking

A Wizard's Guide to Defensive Baking by T. Kingfisher, 306 pages

Mona is a 14-year-old orphan who works in her aunt's bakery, creating delicious baked goods from the crack of dawn each day. But Mona's no ordinary baker. She's also a wizard, but one whose entire magical prowess is baking-related. She can make over-kneaded dough softer and keep buns from burning and make gingerbread men dance, but that's about it. However, to a person who's trying to kill off all of the wizards in town, Mona's meager skills are plenty. Soon, she's on the run from this murderer, and trying to stop him before he catches her.

This is a delightful young adult fantasy, and Mona is a winning protagonist. And even though she doesn't think much of her bread-based powers, I would *LOVE* to have her skills. Her sidekicks are fantastic, and I love the way the motley crew of wizards and their familiars come together (As a side note: this is somehow the second book I've read and loved with a sentient sourdough starter. What an odd and specific subgenre.). Highly recommended!

The Hobbit

The Hobbit by J.R.R. Tolkien  322 pp.

I've been spending quarantine time doing a lot of re-reading of old favorites. This one doesn't take much description. The Hobbit of the title, Bilbo Baggins, has his quiet life interrupted by the arrival of Gandalf, the wizard, and a group of dwarfs. Soon he is enlisted in a quest to help the dwarfs retrieve their treasure which was stolen by the large, fearsome dragon, Smaug the Magnificent. It is on this quest that Bilbo acquires the magic ring from a creepy creature called Gollum. The ring allows him to assist the dwarfs in their successful adventure. The audiobook was read by Rob Inglis.

The Hobbit

The Hobbit or There and Back Again by J.R.R. Tolkien  365 pp.

I originally read the LOTR trilogy and The Hobbit when I was in college. Several years ago I spent a good portion of the summer listening to the audio version of all three LOTR books. I finally got around to listening to The Hobbit. For those who are completely unaware, it is the story of a Hobbit by the name of Bilbo Baggins who is chosen by Gandalf, the wizard, to go on an adventure with a group of dwarves to reclaim their mountain and riches from Smaug, the dragon. Along the way Bilbo finds the ring that gives the wearer invisibility which he uses to much advantage during the journey. The audio version read by Rob Inglis is perfectly voiced including the songs. I enjoyed this version a great deal.

Midnight Riot

Midnight Riot by Ben Aaronovitch 310 pgs.

Peter Grant is just finishing his training as a police officer and is waiting for his permanent assignment.  He works a bizarre murder and interviews a ghost.  Yes, you read that right, he talks to a ghost.  This is handled masterfully in the book.  Peter doesn't really believe in ghost and doesn't really want to tell anyone that he talked to one. Peter soon learns about a lot of supernatural things because he gets drafted into the unit that deals with such things.  It is a unit consisting of his commander and him.  He starts as an apprentice wizard, studies magic and things really move along for him.

Based on the supernatural element, this isn't my kind of book.  However, I really enjoyed this one very much.  Peter is a compelling character, a little bit of a smart-ass and just rolls with the punches.  I will certainly read the next in the series.
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The Ogre of Oglefort

The Ogre of Oglefort by Eva Ibbotson  247 pp.

The late Eva Ibbotson wrote several good children's books about ghosts, witches, and creepy beasts. Sadly, this is her last one, but it contains a gaggle of grim-ish creatures. Princess Mirella doesn't like doing princess-y things and wishes to be a bird rather than get married off to Prince Umberto. Mirella runs away to the Ogre of Oglefort who has the power to change people into animals. The Norns send a hag, a troll, a wizard, and an orphan on a mission to kill the ogre and rescue the princess. Instead of killing him, they end up caring for the ogre, who is depressed and wants to die to join his dead wife. This motley crew defend the ogre's castle against the armies sent by Mirella's parents and a group of ghosts sent by the Norns to finish the job they failed to do. The antics are fun and the characters are quirky, rather than scary.

The Wizard's Tale

The Wizard's Tale by Kurt Busiek 144 pp.

Bafflerog Rumplewhisker is an inept and kindhearted evil wizard who has been ordered to find the long lost Book of Worse. Once the book is found it will mean the end of all hope and light and freedom for everyone in the world. Bafflerog sets off on a quest with his enchanted toad, Gumpwort, and the son of a woodcutter who wants to be a king. Their journey may mean the end of everything. This is a dark story with unexpected humor and lightness. The artwork by David T. Wenzel is perfectly suited to a tale of wizards and magic. This is a fun book.

The Fall of Ile-Rien trilogy / Martha Wells

The Fall of Ile-Rien trilogy: The Wizard Hunters (443 p.), The Ships of Air (475 p.), The Gate of Gods (484 p.) by Martha Wells (1402 p. total in paperback).

I was sick all during the holiday weekend (boo!) and too muzzy-headed to concentrate on anything new, so I went for comfort reads. The Fall of Ile-Rien may be my favorite fantasy trilogy ever. I'm fond of all of Martha Wells' books, but I really, really love Tremaine Valiarde, our main character. (Tremaine would object to being called a "heroine.") She's drawn into her country's war effort because it's dangerous and she has a death wish; she discovers that she wants to stay alive because the enemy sneers at her and damn it, if she's gonna die it's gonna be on her terms. I know I'm doing a really bad job of selling this, but Tremaine just delights me as a character. She doesn't follow the traditional fantasy young-hero-coming-into-power path, which makes her growth and experiences much more interesting to me.

Plus the books are full of all of Martha Wells' strengths: well-drawn settings, interesting and varied characters, culture clashes that make sense from both sides. Some day I'll figure out how to describe her books well enough that everyone else will want to read them, too. If we lived in a just universe, she'd be a bestselling author.

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The Unwritten vol. 3: Dead Man's Knock/Mike Carey & Peter Gross

The Unwritten, Volume 3: Dead Man's Knock; Mike Carey &; Peter Gross; graphic novel, 160p

Okay in my review of Volume 2 of this series I mentioned how Carey and Gross have been taking advantage of the graphic novel medium to really make the most of the story being told. This volume, I must say, takes that to new heights, with the addition of a whole chapter formatted as a CHOOSE YOUR OWN ADVENTURE BOOK. In addition to be bascially the coolest cheesy thing to come out of the 80s/early 90s, the CYOA format is a frankly brilliant way to tell the story of a character who is currently in a coma. The jumbled mindset! it works so well!
Aside from that totally awesome chapter, the rest of the book holds up well, and I feel like the plot is really...congealing, for lack of a better word. Gelling? meshing? This plot feels solid, the characters are in good/interesting/dramatic places in their development, and I cannot wait until the next volume. THE DRAMA! 

Ghost Story / Jim Butcher

Ghost Story by Jim Butcher (v. 13 of the Dresden Files). 481 p.

I pretty much can't say anything about what happens in this book without providing massive, massive spoilers. I will say that I think Butcher has done a very good job of playing fair with the plot, based on the previous worldbuilding he has done throughout this series. I'm also encouraged by indications that characters are going to be dealing with consequences of their previous actions (grr, this is hard to talk about without spoiling it!). Often you have characters saying they'll do "whatever it takes" to make something happen, and they make the thing happen, but the book ends before they have to deal with any fallout from their choices. Not so here.

As usual, I am now on the edge of my seat to see what happens in the next volume of the series. Next summer can't come fast enough.

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Moon over Soho / Ben Aaronovitch

Moon over Soho by Ben Aaronovitch. 288 p.

A sequel to Midnight Riot, which I reviewed here. Peter's personal history comes into play with the big case here, as his father is a jazz musician and he's investigating what may turn out to be a series of magical murders of jazz musicians. Plus he has to continue his magical training, as well as try to deal with his friend Lesley, who was severely disfigured while helping him with an earlier case. I'm enjoing this series a lot, particularly for the way Aaronovitch makes London feel present, almost more like a character than a setting. I hope this series continues soon.


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Storm Front. Maelstrom / Jim Butcher et al.

Jim Butcher's the Dresden Files. Storm Front : vol. 2, Maelstrom. Written by Jim Butcher, Mark Powers ; artwork by Ardian Syaf, Brett Booth ; colors by Mohan, Andrew Dalhouse ; inks by Rick Ketcham ; lettering by Bill Tortolini.

Jim Butcher has said that he visualizes scenes from his Dresden Files books as comics, so adapting the novels into comics makes sense. That said, I much prefer the prose versions. Then again, Storm Front is the first Dresden Files novel, and it's far from my favorite. I'm not sure I'll keep going with the graphic adapations. It's not that they're badly done; it's just that I've already read these stories, and the translation from prose to comic doesn't add anything to the story for me.

But boy, can I not wait for the next (prose) book in the series!

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Our World

Our World (the Dresden Files Roleplaying Game, vol. 2). 262 p.

This is the gamemaster-oriented book for the Dresden Files rpg. It discusses various factions that characters might belong to and describes the setting of the novels--Chicago--in game terms. The bulk of the book, however, is given over to write-ups of most of the characters from the novels, translated into game terms. There's nothing like reading lots of stat-blocks to teach you a system's rules for character building! And since I'm pretty familiar with the novels, it's also intersting to see how a particular character translates into stats. As a side effect, it's making me want to re-read a lot of the novels, especially the earlier ones.

Your Story

Your Story (the Dresden Files Roleplaying Game, vol. 1). 402 p.

This rpg (role-playing game) uses the FATE system to adapt the Dresden Files novels of Jim Butcher into a playable game setting and system. I was somewhat familiar with FATE before reading this, and I enjoy the DF novels, so I was looking forward to checking out this implementation. I'm impressed; the setting is both very faithful to the books (Butcher was involved with the game design) and eminently playable without having to reproduce the plots of the novels. Particularly elegant was the way the designers used the refresh mechanism as a thematic element and as a way to balance characters against one another. The magic system is complex but looks very flexible, which is the way to go if you don't want to end up with huge spell lists like you have in old-school D&D.

(An aside: yes, this is a rulebook for a game, not a novel. But I read every word, cover to cover, so I get to claim it as a "book read"! Also, if anyone is actually interested in system details, I'd be glad to go into more detail, but I don't think this blog is quite the place to do so.)

Grave Peril by Jim Butcher

Grave Peril by Jim Butcher, Fantasy, 378 pages.
The Dresden Files, vol. 3.
This third book in this series finds Harry, Chicago's most prominent wizard and member of the White Council, battling a malevolent spirit that is bent on destroying everyone he cares about. In his efforts to discover how to destroy the spirit, Harry must also battle angry vampires and other denizens of the spirit world. The Dresden series books are quite popular, and the audio series is very well read by James Marsters (Spike in the TV series Buffy the Vampire Slayer), but I don't find myself becoming a big fan. In the couple of Dresden books I have read, Harry always seems to be faced by unbeatable odds that he then defeats at the very last second, thanks to some rather clumsy plot device, or previously unexplained magical rule.


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Side Jobs / Jim Butcher

Side jobs: stories from the Dresden files by Jim Butcher (Dresden files series). 418 p.

In addition to publishing a new novel in this series every year, Jim Butcher has been writing short stories that mostly appear in themed anthologies. This collection brings together all of the stories published to date, plus a new novella, "Aftermath," that follows this year's novel Changes. (Since Changes ended on an enormous cliffhanger, that's a big deal.) I had read some of the stories previously but not all of them, and of course I wanted to read the novella. "Aftermath" doesn't resolve the cliffhanger in any way, but managed to be satisfying nonetheless, and gives us the perspective of a long-running supporting character. That's something that you can see Butcher has gotten better at over the course of his writing career, as exemplified in these stories--learning to write from the perspective of a character who's not Harry Dresden. He's still not terribly good at differentiating character voice--all of the stories are in first person, and everyone's internal narration sounds pretty similar--but he's improved on character perspective. Still, these are short stories designed for enjoyment, and I had a good time with them, even the early ones.

The Enchantment Emporium / Tanya Huff

The Enchantment Emporium by Tanya Huff. 473 p.

A pretty enjoyable urban fantasy featuring a family of powerful magic-users, the Gales ("wizards" isn't quite accurate but I didn't want to expand our tags list unnecessarily). Allie gets a letter from her Gran willing her a junk shop in Calgary--across the country from her close-knit but sometimes smothering family--so, since Allie just lost her job, she goes to investigate the shop and what happened to her Gran. When she arrives, Allie realizes that the "local community" that the shop serves is the fae community.... Adventure ensues.

A note on the writing: the author clearly made a choice here to not explain things in the text, instead letting the reader pick them up by context. In general I like that approach, but I think she may have overdone it just a tad--especially with the background of the Gale family, which is quite complex and still somewhat confusing to me in spots even though I've finished the book. On the other hand, she does explain what a monkey's paw is and how it works, yet she mentions a Hand of Glory (in passing, true) without any sort of explanation. I would think a casual reader is much more likely to know what a monkey's paw is--there's a Simpsons episode featuring one, right?--than a Hand of Glory.

Bone and Jewel Creatures / Elizabeth Bear

Bone and Jewel Creatures by Elizabeth Bear. 130 p.

Too bad this novella isn't longer. Bear has created a fascinating setting--Messaline, City of Jackals--and some interesting characters. Bijou the Artificer, who makes the bone and jewel creatures of the title, knows that her time is coming to an end. So does her enemy Kaulas the Necromancer. When her apprentice Brazen the Enchanter brings her an injured feral child, she has choices to make, which leads her to uncover what Kaulas is planning. Wonderfully atmospheric.