Death Masks

Death Masks by Jim Butcher, 378 pages

In the fifth book of Butcher's Dresden Files series, wizard-for-hire Harry Dresden is tasked with tracking down the stolen Shroud of Turin, which has made its way to Chicago, leaving a trail of mutilated bodies in its wake. Add in a duel-to-the-death with a vampire and some freaky demons, and Harry's got his hands full.

Death Masks is yet another action-packed, demon-filled book aimed at guys (why else would a wand be called a "blasting rod"), which is par for the course with this series; you don't read this series for deep metaphors on life or morals. But even though Butcher still spends a lot more time describing the sexy outfits of various female characters, he is giving them a bit more dimension (and kick-ass power), which is nice to see. He continues to grow as an author, which means I'll continue to pick up these books whenever I need the literary equivalent of a blockbuster action movie.

Summer Knight

Summer Knight by Jim Butcher, 371 pages

In this, the fourth book of the Dresden Files series, Butcher finally seems to be hitting his stride as a writer. Summer Knight finds Chicago-based wizard-for-hire Harry Dresden once again up to his ears in supernatural trouble. He's managed to start a war between a faction of vampires and the White Council of wizards, and his faerie godmother (yup, he's got one of those) has sold him into the service of a faerie queen. In order to dig himself out of this quagmire, he must solve a murder, liaise with the faeries, and somehow manage to dodge all of the beings that are out to murder him.

As I said, this series is getting better as Butcher grows as a writer. Yes, I still have quibbles (for example, it would be great if he could describe a female character without giving us her measurements), but this is a much better-written tale than previous books in the series, especially if you don't think too hard. A good, quick read, like one of those movies you go to in the middle of summer just to munch on popcorn and escape the heat. But, you know, it's a book.

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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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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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.

Fool Moon/Jim Butcher

Fool Moon (The Dresden Files, book 2), by Jim Butcher; urban fantasy; 352 pages (about 8 1/2 hours, listening)

I've had just about everyone I know recommend these books to me, so I finally broke down and read one. I started on the second book (the first book was checked out), but Butcher did a pretty good job of filling in the blanks for me. I loved Harry Dresden's sarcastic narration, even if Butcher seemed to be laying the noir on a bit thick in places. I did have trouble believing that Harry could take the amount of abuse he gets in this book and still be able to walk, let alone fight bad guys, but I realize Butcher was still finding his feet in this book, so I'm willing to cut him some slack. As the title implies, this was the obligatory werewolf book that usually appears early on in every urban fantasy series. I wasn't too excited about it, but I thought Butcher had a pretty unique take on the werewolf legends here, and I found myself getting caught up in the mystery angle of the story, so it moved along pretty fast. I also blame this book for triggering a long discussion on why Klingons are like werewolves, but that's for another time. All in all, I liked it, and will be trying more in the future.

Changes / Jim Butcher

Changes by Jim Butcher. (The Dresden Files, book 12) 438 pp.

I was right--this one doesn't have a happy ending. Harry Dresden, wizard, finds a cause for which he's willing to compromise his principles. As the title indicates, this is going to have a big influence on the rest of the books in the series. It will be interesting to see whether the author can keep everything from going off the rails. Long series are a gamble; if you never change anything they can become stagnant and boring (cf. Janet Evanovich's later Stephanie Plum books) but if you change too much you can lose the good stuff from the early books (cf. Laurell K. Hamilton's Anita Blake books). I hope Butcher's up to the challenge, because I like this series a lot.

Small Favor / Jim Butcher

Small Favor by Jim Butcher. 420 pp.

The next Dresden Files book is due out in 2 weeks, so I wanted a quick refresher. This is one of my favorites from the series--the fae Gruffs (source of the Billy Goats Gruff fairy tale) are fabulous, I like Ivy/The Archive a lot (and Harry's relationship with her foreshadows what's going to happen in the new book, I bet), and Michael Carpenter gets to be awesome, as usual. Harry even manages to survive paying off one of the favors he owes the Queen of Air and Darkness without ending up more in her debt than when he started. This volume is a fun carnival ride with a happy ending; I have a feeling the new book won't end so well.