Review: ‘Turn Coat’ by Jim Butcher (audio)

Posted on July 28, 2011 by paigevest

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Turn Coat

Dresden Files #11

Author: Jim Butcher

Format: audio book

Publisher: Penguin Audio Books

Release Date: 4/10/2009

Length: 14 hour 40 minutes (a 576 page paperback also resides amongst my other Dresden Files books)

Acquired: Audible.com

Sample chapters

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The blurb from the website:

The Warden Morgan has been accused of treason against the Wizards of the White Council–and there’s only one, final punishment for that crime. He’s on the run, wants his name cleared, and needs someone with a knack for backing the underdog. Someone like Harry Dresden.

Now, Harry must uncover a traitor within the Council, keep a less-than-agreeable Morgan under wraps, and avoid coming under scrutiny himself. And a single mistake may cost someone his head–someone like Harry.

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My spoiler-riddled thoughts:

“The Wardens are coming. Hide me. Please.” Not the words Harry would have ever expected to hear from White Council Warden Donald Morgan, who shows up at Harry’s door, bloodied and scared, and then passes out.

After Waldo Butters patches him up and he regains consciousness, Morgan tells Harry how he’s been framed for the murder of one of the Senior Council, Wizard LaFortier. They discuss the situation and both understand that it had to have been an inside job. Harry smells the Black Council all over it. He decides to help Morgan in order to stop the traitor, lest the treachery continue he possibly finds himself the victim of a future frame.

After a run to Thomas’ apartment to pick up a medical kit for Morgan, Harry senses something following him. He can’t spot a tail so he decides to take a gander with his Wizard’s Sight and boy, does he ever get an eyeful. What he sees is so horrific, so utterly wrong, that he literally wrecks his car and staggers, sick, disoriented andcounting prime numbers all the while to keep from losing his mind, to Billy and Georgia’s nearby apartment.

After recovering, he realizes that the creature followed him and when it somehow cuts power to the entire neighborhood, Harry heads out with several of the Alphas to confront it. It doesn’t go well. The creature rips through the kids and gets away, leaving one of the Alphas dead and one near death. Harry thinks that he knows what it is, though… a skinwalker.

On his way home to finally tend to Morgan, Harry runs into Karrin Murphy. She was told of the wrecked and impounded Blue Beetle, and then heard about the power outage and the disturbance in Billy’s neighborhood, added it all together and came up with Harry Dresden. He tells her what’s been going on as she drives him home and we get a quick Murphy update to summarize the first few chapters:

“So let me get this straight, you’re hiding a fugitive from your own people’s cops, and you think the guy’s been set up in order to touch off a civil war within the White Council. And there’s some kind of Navajo boogeyman loose in town, following you around and attempting to kill you…”

Yup, that’s about it so far, Murph!

With Thomas’ help, Harry stashes Morgan, Molly and Mouse in a storage container he’s set up as an emergency bolthole and then heads to Edinburgh Scotland, via the Nevernever. He chats with Ebenezar McCoy about Morgan’s likely innocence and then seeks out Injun Joe Listens-To-Wind who’s investigating the scene of the murder. He then chats with the Merlin and offers his services in clearing Morgan’s name… so the Merlin instructs Peabody, a clerk, to hand over the file on the case to Warden Dresden. Peabody does so but Harry refuses to sign it out, he just takes it, much to the clerk’s chagrin.

Back at the ranch… erm, Harry’s basement apartment, rather… he and Murphy look over the file to see what they can see, which isn’t much. Except for the gigantic sum of money that was deposited into Morgan’s account, making it look like he was paid off to kill LaFortier. Murph suggests trying to follow the money but then Harry then gets an urgent call from his brother.

Thomas sounds frantic and tells Harry that he needs to get to the storage unit, that he can’t handle them all. The call is cut off so Harry and Murph beat it over to the storage facility where they find a whole crowd of creepy identical constructs which Harry refers to as grey suits and later on, as grey men (no, not those Gray Men) being controlled by a practitioner called Binder. Binder has apparently been hired to find Morgan and has tracked him to the area. Working together, Molly and Morgan manage to circle him and cut him off from the Nevernever so that the constructs fail and he’s alone… and then Murphy takes him down and cuffs him. She waits for the cops while Harry, Morgan, Molly and Mouse beat it out of there.

They discuss how they might have been found and Molly points out that they knew Morgan was in the vicinity but not which storage unit so they decide to go back to Harry’s place in order to reacquire the apparently non-magical tail that they seem to have picked up. Harry’s hoping to find out who hired Binder by first finding out who’s tailing him. With a little help from Toot-toot, who’s now a foot tall Harry finds a PI in the building across the street. Molly comes through with the assist and discovers that the PI was hired by a law firm. Harry goes a’calling. Only he discovers that the lawyer who did the hiring has had her mind tampered with, by a female White Court vampire. Hmmm, let me see… an ancient, evil skinwalker (which is essentially shape-shifter that can veil itself) and the Black Council together are a kind of a walk in the park for Harry so, I know! Let’s toss in some vampires to spice this plot up a bit!

Harry returns home to find Luccio at his apartment and poor Morgan gets his cold, hard Warden heart broken when he realizes that Luccio and Harry are involved. His reaction is actually kind of touching and sad. And then, oh yeah, you remember what an ass he can be and you get over it.

Harry takes Luccio along to meet with Lara Raith, thinking that she must have hired the lawyer that hired the PI that… well, you know. It’s rather obvious from their conversation that she’s not responsible and she takes the opportunity to dress down Harry and the White Council in general for a moment before alarms start going off. Chateau Raith is under attack. And Harry realizes that it’s the skinwalker. Oh, boy.

The skinwalker, henceforth known as Shagnasty, pretty much rips Harry, Lara and everyone else a new one before getting down to the nitty gritty. He tells Harry that he has Thomas and offers to trade him for the doomed warrior. Great, the bloody skinwal– erm, Shagnasty wants Morgan, too. That guy knows how to piss people off, alright.

Before heading out to figure out just how the hell he might orchestrate the rescue of his brother, a wounded and drugged Justine talks with Harry within Luccio’s hearing. She says enough that Luccio is able to deduce that Thomas is Harry’s brother and then reveals to Harry that she knew their mother.

Harry visits Murphy at SI headquarters where she’s holding Binder. She releases him and Harry’s newly hired PI (who quit the job tailing Harry because he wasn’t into the attempted murder thing) follows Binder to a hotel. Harry arrives and overhears Binder speaking to Madeline Raith who mentions that she tipped the Council off to Morgan’s whereabouts.

Great. So much for having time to solve the case. The clock, as they say, is now ticking and Harry is feeling a bit overwhelmed. He thinks at this point, ‘Maybe it was time to admit it, this one was too big for me. It had been from the very start.’

Harry formulates a plan and decides to move Morgan to the Water Beetle. They head out to the creepy island in Lake Michigan on which the Denarians held Marcone and Ivy in Small Favor. Harry leaves Murph on the mainland but they have a very touching conversation before he goes. Knowing the events at the end of Changes actually makes this little chat a lot more heart-wrenching than it was the first couple of times I read it!

On the island, Harry leaves Morgan and Molly on the boat and travels to the broken down tower on top of the hill. There, he performs a sanctum invocation to create a bond with the land, which he isn’t sure he will survive. But he does. As he later described it to Wizard Rashid of the Senior Council, he punched the spirit of the island, which is a genius loci, in the nose and now they’re friends. He names the island Demonreach and when he is on the island, he has access to the island’s latent energy which will give his own spells a bit of an extra punch. He also seems to have developed an awareness of anything and everything on the island, provided he is there.

Harry heads back to the mainland to take care of a few details in order to set his plan into motion. One such detail is calling the White Council to tell them he’s got Morgan and that he’ll be on the island at sundown, with a witness that can testify to Morgan’s innocence. He then calls Lara Raith who tells him that the money in Morgan’s account came from a dummy corporation owned by the Raith family. Lara realizes that her cousin, Madeline Raith is responsible and is working for someone that’s trying to play the White Council against the White Court. Harry invites her along for the festivities on the island that evening, too.

Harry has also arranged for Shagnasty to be informed at the opportune time that Morgan is on the island and that Harry will trade him for Thomas. His hope is that with a little help from his fellow wizards and a few White Court vamps, he’ll be able to take out the skinwalker, thereby rescuing his brother without tipping the Council to the fact that they’re related. It was actually rather fortuitous that Madeline Raith betrayed her cousin and their house, it gave Harry the excuse of bringing Lara in to declare her innocence and demand the return of her brother.

But nothing ever goes as planned, does it? At least not as planned by Harry. Ah, well… you know what they say about the best laid plans of Mouse and grey men… and wizards.

Ebenezar, Ancient Mai and Injun Jo Listens-to-Wind arrive at Demonreach via boat, several Wardens in tow -not literally, they were actually aboard the boat- to arrest Harry. They pause when Lara Raith and her sisters pop in and Lara makes a show of blaming Harry for her brother’s abduction. Harry then senses dozens of beings arriving on the island and realizes that Madeline and Binder have arrived, and that Binder has summoned gray men from the Nevernever. A lot of them.

As if that weren’t enough, Harry senses more arrivals and concludes that the traitor has taken the bait… and he’s brought a hell of a lot of friends. The wizards and the vamps form a temporary alliance and rush to meet their attackers. A frenzied battle ensues. I won’t detail that battle here but it features werewolves, a crispy vamp, giant spiders and pixies. It’s a pretty damn good battle. You should read it. Chapter 42, page 417 in the paperback.

Battle, fighting, fire, blood, etc., and the time eventually comes when Harry senses that Shagnasty has arrived on the island with Thomas. It heads uphill to the tower and Harry races to beat him to the top because Morgan and Molly are holed up inside the little cottage near the tower. Another furious battle ensues, between Harry and Shagnasty. Harry actually holds his own for a little bit and then Toot-toot is there, attacking the creature, brave and stupid as he can be. After poor Toot is swatted out of the air and lands in some bushes, Listens-to-Wind shows up… and proceeds to kick the skinwalker’s ass. Which. Absolutely. Rocks.

With foes fled or defeated, Thomas rescued but taken by Lara, and no traitor outed, Harry, Molly and Mouse, head to Edinburgh for Morgan’s trial. Harry has a picture provided by his PI (say that three times fast) of a White Council member that traveled the Way through the Nevernever and had no business being in Chicago the previous evening… so he presents his photographic evidence and is scoffed at, as expected.

But then Mouse testifies. As such. He growls at the White Council clerk and Harry states that Mouse smelled him when he entered Chicago from the Nevernever the previous evening. Ancient Mai, among others, attests to the fact that Mouse is a genuine Foo dog and so his word… or his growl rather, is taken as testimony and the traitor is found.

And then he escapes.

The Merlin shows off a bit of his own badassery by organizing the Council, sending Harry after Peabody and fending off the wicked killer mist that Peabody had unleashed upon the assembled wizards before fleeing. Harry catches him but is unable to best him and is surprised by the arrival of Morgan who saves Harry’s life yet again when he shoots Peabody in the head. Twice. Wizards follow the double tap rule, too.

Morgan, sadly, doesn’t survive his wounds and massive blood loss, but expresses his thanks in a roundabout way and tells Harry the truth: Luccio killed LaFortier and that he was trying to protect his old master and mentor… the woman he loved.

It turns out that Peabody had been messing with a whole bunch of minds of the members of the White Council. He was responsible for Luccio’s actions and so she had absolutely no memory of the murder she had committed. She also wasn’t aware of what Morgan had done for her. Sadly, Peabody was even responsible for her relationship with Harry so that she could keep close tabs on him and Harry endured a rather uncomfortable Luccio breaking it off with him after they’d both recovered somewhat from their wounds.

To Harry, the most devastating casualty of the whole conflict was the end of his brother’s attempt to rein in his hunger. Thomas’ torture at the hands of the skinwalker was utterly devastating to him and it destroyed his inhibitions about feeding heavily upon and even killing humans. He now only sees people as food, food, food. Harry is horrified but promises to give Thomas time and space even though Thomas doesn’t see his new attitude as being a problem. He’s accepted his demon. Embraced it, even.

Harry also saw a bit of an entry in Ebenezar’s journal regarding Harry and Demonreach. It alludes to the fact that the island is more than an island and that it involves a mantle that he wouldn’t mind seeing Harry take up. Then it says, “I trust his judgement. Then again, I trusted Maggie’s, too.” Just a couple of morsels to nibble on until we find out from a future book what the hell all of that means!

All in all, Turn Coat was yet another action-packed Dresden Files adventure. There are so many things happening, not just in this book but in this leg of the series, that it’s somewhat difficult to keep it all straight! This is one reason I include spoilers galore in these write-ups, so that later on, I can read through them and actually remember the events of the books.

Next in the line-up is book #12, Changes. I’ve only listened to this book once, when it was released last year… so if you think my last couple of Dresden reviews are long, I apologize in advance for the next one. Of course, the next installment in the series–#13, Ghost Story–was released two days ago but I won’t be listening to the audio. Instead, I’ll be reading the hardcover in a couple of weeks, so that review take a little while to be published.

And now, Mr. Marsters… you may begin.

My own personal summary:

The one in which Harry: discovers a wounded Donald Morgan at his door and then hides him from the Wardens who are after him for the murder of a member of the Senior Council; encounters a Nagloshi Skinwalker which kills one of the Alphas; visits a kinky vamp club where Thomas beats the crap out of his cousin; travels to White Council headquarters in Ediburgh, Scotland via the Nevernever; makes an offer to the Merlin to find the real killer and clear Morgan’s name; hires a PI; performs a Sanctum invocation on the creepy island from Small Favor, survives and comes away with some kind of bond with the island which he names Demonreach; arranges a meeting of Senior Council members and White Court vamps on Demonreach to simultaneously draw out and expose the White Council traitor and rescue Thomas from the skinwalker; takes Mouse to wizard court as a witness; joins a secret wizard group; gets dumped; and introduces Butters to the Alphas.

Fave quotes:

“He was wrong. It doesn’t make him a villain. It just makes him an asshole.” ~Harry to Butters, about Morgan

“Oh, bite me wizard boy.” ~Butters to Harry

‘You can’t abandon life just because it’s scary, and just because sometimes you get hurt.’

‘Sometimes irony is a lot like a big old kick in the balls.’

“Madeline, go away before I beat you to death with my bare hands.” ~Thomas to his cousin, Madeline Raith

“You… are… vastly irritating.” ~Morgan to Harry

‘How the hell was I supposed to do the right thing, if there wasn’t a right thing?’

“If a revolver was good enough for Indiana Jones, it’s good enough for me.” ~Harry to Murphy

“If you knew half the things I’ve done that you think are impossible, you’d already be running.” ~Harry to Binder

“You’re a real humanitarian. A regular Mother Theresa.” ~Harry to Lara Raith

“Murph, you’re one hell of a dame.” ~Harry

“I swear. I swear to God, Morgan, if you don’t explain yourself, I’m going to strangle you dead with my own hands and drag your corpse back to Edinburgh by the balls.” ~Harry

“I feel less left out now that I know someone might kill me anyway.” ~Murphy

“I’d rather have you covering my back than anyone in the world, Karrin. You might be the best friend I ever had.” ~Harry

‘Fire erupted in an explosion that lifted the skinwalker another dozen feet into the air, tumbling tail over teakettle, an expression that makes no goddamn sense whatsoever, yet seemed oddly appropriate to the moment.’

“Don’t plan to bind you or banish you old ghost, just gonna kick your ass up between your ears.” ~Injun Joe to Shagnasty

“This is Waldo Butters, and his geek penis is longer and harder than all of ours put together.” ~Harry to Will and Georgia

Check out my other Dresden Files reviews:

Review: ‘Small Favor’ by Jim Butcher (audio)

Posted on July 25, 2011 by paigevest

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Small Favor

Dresden Files #10

Author: Jim Butcher

Format: audio book

Publisher: Penguin Audio Books

Release Date: 1/14/2009 (original release date: 4/1/2008)

Length: 13 hour 49 minutes (a 541 page paperback also resides amongst my other Dresden Files books)

Acquired: Audible.com

Sample chapters

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The back cover blurb:

Wizard Harry Dresden’s life finally seems to be calming down. The White Council’s war with the vampiric Red Court is easing up, no one’s tried to kill him lately, and his eager apprentice is starting to learn real magic. For once, the future looks fairly bright.

But the past casts one hell of a long shadow.

Mab, monarch of the Winter Court of the Sidhe, calls in an old favor from Harry. Just one small favor he can’t refuse–one that will trap Harry Dresden between a nightmarish foe and an equally deadly ally, and strain his skills and loyalties to their very limits.

And everything was going so well for once…

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My spoiler-riddled thoughts:

Nearly a year after the end of White Night, Harry is conducting a lesson with Molly Carpenter in her parents’ back yard. Kids are throwing snowballs, Harry is chatting amiably with Charity Carpenter, all is well and all is well. And then it’s not.

Harry, Charity and the kids are attacked by creatures Harry’s never seen before. The whatsits, as he thinks of them, go after the kids to distract Harry so another of them can sucker punch him. He manages not to get killed but does manage to get his nose broken which of course gives him two black eyes, leading everyone he meets throughout the rest of the book to ask what happened to him, which makes for some amusing dialogue. Charity Carpenter turns out to be the hero of the tussle, killing a whatsit with a nail gun and a hammer. The rest of the whatsits flee. Faeries… they don’t like the iron so much.

A little research and Harry learns that the creatures were gruffs and that they’re agents of Summer. Harry can’t figure out why Summer would send hitters after him but as the book progresses, he’s pursued by increasingly older brothers of the first gruffs. It gets… interesting.

In the meantime, Murphy calls him in on a case involving a building which had been blown apart and Harry soon realizes that the destruction involved magic. LOTS of magic. In order to try and figure out what might have occurred, Harry calls upon Toot-toot the pixie to help him gather some information about what any little folk in the area may have seen. Toot returns almost immediately and tells Harry to run. When a pixie thinks something is more important than a donut, it’s wise to heed their advice. Harry runs but soon becomes lost in a whiteout… and realizes that he’s not alone.

Mab, the Queen of Air and Darkness has popped in from the Nevernever to ask a little favor of Harry. He still owes her two favors since he took her case in book #4, Summer Knight and should have the option of refusing when she asks. Only this time, he’s given little choice but to do what she wants, which is for him to be her emissary in a delicate matter of kidnapping. Or mob-boss-napping, seeing how it’s Johnny Marcone who was forcibly taken from the destroyed building, which he owns and was apparently using as a safe house earlier that night. Mab wants Harry to find Marcone and since it’s in Harry’s best interest to do as she bids, he takes the case.

Having just become an emissary of Winter, Harry is almost immediately threatened with a shotgun to the head by none other than the Summer Knight. Fix is worried that Harry’s actually taken up the mantle of the Winter Knight and is intensely relieved to find that Harry has done no such thing. Still, it rather pisses Harry off to be so threatened by his friend. Throw in the fact that Fix didn’t warn him about the gruffs and Harry’s quite testy, though he quickly comes to realize that Fix is once again under compulsion not to reveal certain information to Harry. Fix does manage to drop a hint about the oak leaf pin given to Harry by Lily, the Summer Lady, at the end of book #8, Proven Guilty and Harry surmises that the gruffs have been using the pin to track him. Useful information to have, which allows him to get the gruffs off his back for awhile in order to concentrate on Marcone.

The first order of business toward that end is to find Hendricks and Gard, who were with Marcone when he was taken. When Harry, accompanied by his brother Thomas, finds them however, he also finds a bunch of Denarians trying to kill them and/or kidnap them. Of course! Harry wasn’t having enough of a bad time with the friggin’ billy goats gruff trying to kill him and then Mab freezing his eyeballs to make him agree to doing her a favor… he’s now got to deal with more Denarians! Quite a lot more than he faced in book #5, Death Masks. Great. Fantastic. It’s the typical ‘shit flying at Harry from all sides without cease‘ kind of plot but then by this point in the series, we expect no less from a Dresden book!

Amazingly, this new bunch of Denarians actually try to cut a deal with Harry and convince him to let them take Marcone’s people, promising to leave him alone in return. Like that would ever happen. Either Harry cutting a deal with them or them keeping a promise! Harry declines and manage to escape with Thomas, Hendricks and a badly injured Gard and they head to Michael’s house, hoping the Denarians won’t know to look there for them. Upon arriving at Michael’s house, they find Sanya, who is stuck in the city by the heavy snowfall. Harry then succeeds in enlisting the help of the two remaining Knights of the Cross, who join his cause in an effort to offset, and hopefully to permanently diffuse the Denarian threat.

Harry calls in the White Council to assist with the negotiations for the return of Marcone (since he’s a signatory of the accords), and requests that they bring in the Archive to mediate. Harry’s worked with Ivy before and is perhaps a bit too fond of her, according to Captain Luccio of the Wardens. Harry is indeed fond of the child Archive which means that he gets REALLY pissed when the Denarians, led by Nicodemus, kidnap her, too. It would seem that kidnapping Marcone was just a ploy to prompt Harry to call in the Archive so that they could take her and force her to take up a coin. Yeah. Things, they aren’t going so well.

So… Harry plans an assault on the Denarians, under the guise of a trade: 11 captured coins representing over a third of the Fallen, and the sword Fidelacchius in trade for Marcone and Ivy. The only problem is that Denarians are holding their prisoners on an island on Lake Michigan–in blizzard conditions, mind–and they’ve got an unknown number of minions backing them up. Needless to say, all hell breaks loose. BUT, Harry gets Ivy and Marcone off the island, as well as Sanya and Michael… though when he last sees the latter, his old friend has just been peppered with automatic machine gun fire. And he’s not moving.

And so the time comes for Harry’s checklist, which are fantastic ways to sum things up for a review… so thanks for these, Mr. Butcher!

‘I seized the hilt of Fidelacchius from where the sword had fallen. As my fingers closed around the weapon I realized several points of cold logic, as if having them explained to me by a calm, rational, wise old man who was utterly unperturbed by my rage.

First, I realized that I was now alone on an uncharted island in the middle of Lake Michigan, with nothing but mad men and fallen angels for company.

Second, that I still had the coins and the sword that Nicodemus had been after–and that he was still going to be after them.

Third, that the Denarians were sure to be really ticked off, now that I’d taken their real prize from them.

Fourth… The ground shook, as with the impact of a heavy foot.

Fourth, that since I had confounded Summer’s attempt to track me via use of the little oak leaf pin, Eldest Brother Gruff had probably been waiting for me to use fire magic again in battle–the same magic that I had entwined with the power of the Summer Lady two years ago at Arctis Tor. It was the most probable reason why Mab, the most likely suspect for messing with my head, would have taken my blasting rod and my memories of how to use fire magic in battle–to prevent me from inadvertently revealing my position to Summer every time I got into a tussle. Only now that I had, Eldest Gruff was probably on his way to visit.

And fifth, and last, I realized that I had no way to get off this stupid and creepily familiar island–unless I could get down to the docks and to the boat I’d come in on.’

Before he can do so, he’s accosted by first the Eldest Brother Gruff, who rips apart a Denarian like it’s a firggin’ teddy bear, and then Daddy Denarian, Nicodemus who laughingly thinks that Lasciel is still around. Of course Harry survives both encounters, but I’ll not divulge exactly how he did either. This book is worth reading–or listening to, since James Marsters is as fantastic as ever in his reading–just for those two awesome scenes!

The book ends on a rather worrying note as we’re left wondering at the fate of Michael Carpenter. One thing is clear, if he survives, he’ll not wield Amoracchius again and the sword is given into Harry’s possession with the same directive as he was given along with Fidelacchius, that he would know who to give it to.

And so ends my review of book #10… I left quite a lot out but we all know how wordy I get so I thought it best to stop here! I’m hoping to have books 11 and 12 listened to and reviewed by the end of the week(…end… ish). Apologies for not getting them finished in time for tomorrow’s release of book #13, Ghost Story, but it kind of worked out for me since I’ll not acquire my own signed and personalized copy of the new book *insert fangirl squee* until next week at the soonest. Can. Not. Wait!

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My own personal summary:

The one in which Harry: is being hunted by the billy goats gruff; gets a favor called in by Mab; sets out to rescue Johnny Marcone at Mab’s behest; gets tangled up with the Denarians–again; calls in the Archive to mediate the release of Baron Marcone from said Denarians; discovers that Sanya, in addition to Shiro, was descended from kings; guilts out over Ivy getting Archive-napped by the Denarians; gets wooed once again by Nicodemus; realizes that his friends don’t wholly trust him and then realizes that someone has literally been screwing with his mind; sets Molly to researching her family tree, which leads her to discover that Michael is descended from Charlemange; tells Murphy about Lash; rescues Ivy and Marcone from an eerily familiar and creepy island; cashes in his boon from Summer and orders a donut from the Eldest Brother Gruff; discovers that a Denarian has been working for the Black Council; cusses out God in the hospital chapel; chats with an archangel which sounds quite a lot like Ebenezar McCoy (!); gets the bejesus scared out of him–again–by Mab; learns that Bob is considered dangerous by the Wardens, and that they think he’s been destroyed; realizes that he’s been granted the power of Soulfire; and has a hot date with Luccio.

Fave quotes:

“I’ve always admired your ability to be unilaterally irritating.” ~Bob to Harry

‘I gritted my teeth and tried to summon up a salvo of snark.’

‘…my curiosity took the opportunity to sucker punch terror while confusion had it distracted.’

‘Whew. My banter gland had not gone necrotic.’

‘It’s amazing what you can get used to if your daily allowance of bizarre is high enough.’

‘A sensitive guy might have been hurt by that remark. Good thing I’m me.”

“I’m freaking adorable. Especially with the raccoon face I’ve got going here.”~Harry to Torelli

“You… are so hot right now.” ~Harry to Murphy

“I’m in. From here on out. You obviously need somebody to protect you from the big, bad billy goats.” ~Murphy to Harry

‘”Heh?” I said wittily.’

“You’ve invented a doll that turns people into their ugly half-brothers, eh?” ~Thomas to Harry

“Look, big guy, I’ve had a tense couple of days and I’ve got to tell you, burning someone’s face off sounds like a great way to relax.” ~Harry

“Lassie would have given a clear, concise warning. One bark for gruffs, two barks for Nickel-heads.“ ~Harry to Mouse

“You said it, Chewie. I’ve got a bad feeling about this.” ~Harry to Mouse

“I followed the trail of smitten fiends. Smitten fiends? Smited fiends? Smoted fiends? Don’t look at me, I never finished high school.” ~Harry

“If you make me choose between you and Luccio, I’m pretty sure I know who I’m going to bid ‘aloha’.” ~Harry to Kincaid

“Punctuality is for people with nothing better to do.” ~Harry

“That’s the problem with you nearly immortal types. You couldn’t spot a pop culture reference if it skittered up and implanted an embryo in your esophagus.” ~Harry to Rosanna

Check out my other Dresden Files reviews:

Review: ‘White Night’ by Jim Butcher (audio)

Posted on July 19, 2011 by paigevest

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White Night

Dresden Files #9

Author: Jim Butcher

Format: audio book

Publisher: Penguin Audio Books

Release Date: 4/23/09 (original release date: 4/3/07)

Length: 14 hours 13 minutes (a 452 page paperback also resides amongst my other Dresden Files books)

Acquired: Audible.com

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The back cover blurb:

Someone is targeting the city’s magic practitioners, the members of the supernatural underclass who don’t possess enough power to become full-fledged wizards. Many have vanished. Others appear to be victims of suicide. But the murderer has left a calling card at one of the crime scenes–a message for Harry Dresden, referencing the book of Exodus and the killing of witches.

Harry sets out to find the killer before he can strike again, but his investigation turns up evidence pointing to the one suspect he cannot possibly believe guilty: his half brother, Thomas. Determined to bring the real murderer to justice and clear his brother’s name, Harry attracts the attention of the White Court of vampires, becoming embroiled in a power struggle that renders him outnumbered, outclassed, and dangerously susceptible to temptation.

Harry knows that if he screws this one up, a lot of people will die–and one of them will be his brother.

My spoiler-riddled thoughts, helped along by a few quotes from the book:

The problem with waiting for weeks after finishing a book to write the review is that some tidbits of the story tend to get lost in the haze of memory. It’s especially bad when a procrastinating reviewer picks up the next book in the series because they simply cannot wait to dive into another piece of Harry’s world. I’m a bad reviewer. I’ve said it before and I’m reiterating that glaring personal fault yet again. I’m trying to remedy this gross oversight in my book reviewing repertoire and in doing so, hope that I don’t mangle this review… because this was SUCH a good book and SO much happens, as is pretty much run-of-the-mill for Dresden Files books, especially those written later in the series. But I must get it finished and you know what they say about liking the present and something about not having time. Or something.

Whatever the case, I’m finally battening down the hatches and getting down to the nitty gritty. Partly because this book deserves its moment here on my blog and partly because I still have THREE more Dresden Files books to listen to and then review before book #13 in the series, Ghost Story is released. In a week. I will NOT be waiting to pick it up because I have unfinished reviews on my plate. Or in my blog. Nosiree… Sadly, I won’t be able to download the audio and listen to the masterful reading of James Marsters as I have with every other book in this series, since he was unable to do this book. *insert hysterical fangirl sobbing here* I vow that I will not buy the audio ~~unless~~ until it’s released being read by Mr. Marsters, who is the voice of Harry Dresden. The hardcover will have to suffice for the nonce and I’ll have to imagine Marsters’ voice in my head, which shouldn’t be too terribly difficult, as I’ve listed to him read this series multiple times. Now, enough of my mewling and blathering… on with the review!

So, we begin this 9^th installment of Butcher’s popular Dresden Files series with an unusual case. As if Harry ever has normal cases. It’s off the books as SI has had budget cuts and the recently demoted Sergeant Murphy is stubbornly paying Harry’s fee out of her own pocket. Chicago PD has investigated several apparent suicides but Murphy wants Harry’s take and of course, he finds magical evidence that the latest suicide was indeed, murder.

In fact, it seems as though the murderer specifically wanted Harry’s attention but in taking this case, Harry is dragged into a power struggle within the White Court of vampires. Now I’ve seen a few reviews and comments that criticize Mr. Butcher for the ongoing vampire war and politics storyline. It would seem that some people just want a monster of the week type series with no deep thinking or intrigue. Me? I eat this stuff up. I personally feel that with all of the added drama and plots that run through multiple books, Butcher is able to add so many facets to the story that make the series more enjoyable, in my opinion.

Enough about that, however. Back to it.

Harry’s inquiries lead him to an order of local magic practitioners, none strong enough to be on the White Council, who have dubbed themselves the Ordo Lebes, or the Order of the Cauldron. Cauldron… large cooking pot. Whichever translation you prefer. The women in the Ordo are terrified that whoever is killing their peers will eventually get them all so they’ve hired someone to help protect them. That someone is none other than Elaine Mallory, one-time student of Harry’s former teacher, Justin DuMorne and Harry’s first love. He also finds another old acquaintance with the group. One Helen Beckitt, first (and last) seen in the first book of the series, Storm Front. Knowing what he does about Helen, he automatically suspects her.

However, Harry hears evidence pointing to the killer possibly being a Warden of the White Council so he’s doubly motivated to find who’s to responsible for the deaths and stop them. Wait, make that triply motivated as Harry discovers that one of the victims most likely died at the hands of a White Court vampire and then sees a security camera image of the latest missing woman in the company of a White vamp he knows very well: Thomas Raith.

He tries to find Thomas and discovers a room in his brother’s swanky new apartment which contains something that could be very damning: information on all of the victims, including pictures that were obviously taken before the police had arrived. Harry is determined to solve the case and find the killer, thus clearing the Wardens AND his brother, but… there are a few things standing in his way. Namely, his pal and Thomas’ cousin, Madrigal Raith from Proven Guilty. Yes, he’s back, he’s brought friends and he’s got a bone to pick with Harry. What bad guy doesn’t?

In his pursuit of the truth of this case, Harry utilizes Little Chicago (in a typically bad-ass Harry Dresden kind of way) to follow a suspect and learns that he’s got a couple of suspects. He then tracks Thomas using his pentacle amulet, which is the twin of Thomas’, and finds his brother hiding several women and children on a boat called the Water Beetle. As it turns out, Thomas is not the killer but Harry’s frustrated that Thomas had knowledge of the murders and didn’t share the information with him. Told you there would be spoilers, hope you’ve read the book!

So Thomas is innocent and much relief ensues but as they discuss getting the women and children to a safe house, they’re attacked by Madrigal Raith and a gaggle of ghouls. No, Professor Lockhart wasn’t present, don’t get your ‘wizards named Harry’ mixed up this late in the game. While fleeing the boat and certain death in a grotesque and gory way, Harry is shot in the back. He’s wearing his warded leather duster and so isn’t killed but he does fall stunned into the depths of Lake Michigan. He essentially blacks out and has a flashback to a ghoul attack on a boot camp for trainee Wardens the previous summer in New Mexico.

Harry survives, of course and gets back to the business of solving this latest in a series of bizarre cases. He takes stock of what he knows and sums things up:

The facts, man. Just the facts. Fact 1: Male operatives of House Scavis and House Malvora had been engaging in murders that attempted to frame the Wardens as the perpetrators. Fact 2: House Raith, their nominal superior led by the White King, sort of, had pursued a policy of armistice with the White Council. Fact 3: That dippy twit Madrigal jumped into the deal on Malvora’s side, pitching in a murder or two of his own, evidently to attract my attention. Fact 4: Thomas, though aware of the lethal intentions of his fellow White Court vampires, had shared nothing of it with me. Fact 5: The victims had been women of magical talent, universally.

Harry has several more facts to think on but these five are enough to clue him in to what’s really going on -that the whole thing has just been a play for power within the White Court, to undermine the peace talks between the White Court and the White Council as well as to cull the herd, so to speak, of magical practitioners. So Harry plans… a counter attack, if you will. I love this bit of conversation between Harry and Murph regarding what Harry’s going to do about the division in the White Court and the possible implications of an alliance between the Whites and the Reds: “You have a plan,” she stated. “I have a plan.” “What’s the plan, Harry?” I told her. She looked at me for a second and then said, “You’re crazy.” “Be positive, Murph! You call it crazy, I call it unpredictable.”

Before marching forth into battle and almost certain death, Harry has a chat with the shade of Lasciel about change. Harry mentions to Lash that he’s been angrier since she showed up and wonders if she might know why that is. “I told you once before, my host,” the shadow said, “you are easier to talk to when you are asleep.” Which was just chilling, taken in that context. Everyone has that part of them that needs to be reined in. It’s that little urge you sometimes feel to hop over the edge of a great height when you’re looking out from a high building. It’s the immediate spark of anger you feel when someone cuts you off and makes you want to run your car into that moron. It’s the flash of fear in you when something surprises you at night, leaving you quivering with your body primed to fight or flee. Call it the hind brain, the subconscious, whatever, I’m not a shrink. But it’s there. And it’s real. Mine wore a lot of black even before Lasciel showed up. Like I said, chilling.

Harry goes on to tell Lash that she can chat up his subconscious all she wants, that it’s not going to do her any good, that he’ll never take up the coin. In the meantime, those conversations with his other self may have elicited changes in her, also. He points out to her that she is but a copy of Lasciel, the fallen angel and that who she’s become while existing outside of her whole self will die once taken back into herself. Harry tries to explain to her that she could exist as her own ‘person’ as she is, that she has a choice. He tells her, “Lash, just because you start out as one thing, it doesn’t mean you can’t grow into something else,” which drives her away, prompting him to get back to the problem at hand. ‘Get your head in the game, Harry. Defeat the whole damn White Court now, worry about taking on Hell later.’

So Harry is set to take on the murderers he’s been tracking who also happen to be card carrying members of the White Court. He calls in fellow Warden, Carlos Ramirez to give him a hand and Carlos sums the situation up rather nicely: “We’re going to stomp into the middle of a big meeting of the White Court, call a couple of them murderers, challenge them to a duel, and kill them right in front of all of their friends and relatives, right?”

And that’s just what they do. It… doesn’t go well. Harry and Ramirez kick ass but then all hell breaks loose, as hell tends to do. The extraction Harry had pre-arranged with his old frenemy (yeah, I hate that word, too… but it’s rather spot on in this case!) Gentlemen Johnny Marcone turns into a bigger operation than was intended, and so pretty much everyone but Harry and Lara Raith are rescued. Harry’s subjected to a psychic attack by a White vamp and is only saved by the intervention of Lash, who essentially sacrifices herself to save Harry. Lasciel the fallen angel is still around, imprisoned in the coin, but Lash, the bit of her that had been riding around in Harry’s head, is now gone. Harry manages to save Lara Raith’s life and blows the shit out of most of what’s left of the White Court. I didn’t do this scene justice but this review is already over long so I thought I’d paraphrase a bit.

The end of the book finds Harry retrieving the buried coin of Lasciel from its grave in his basement and surrendering it to Father Forthill. Finally, dust settled and all, he follows Thomas to learn how he’s earning his living and feeding, which gives a rather lighthearted ending to what was quite an involved and heavy storyline.

Up to this point, I think that each book I’ve just finished is my favorite of the series but then I read the next one and I’m not so sure. I think that Butcher just improves this story so much with each installment and adds so many plot twists and interesting characters to the line-up that as a reader and a huge fan, I just can’t help but love the series more with each book and I’m so excited for Ghost Story!

My own personal summary of the book:

The one in which Harry: takes a case in which women who commit suicide are actually being murdered; finds an old acquaintance from book 1 with a group of witches; begins to suspect his brother of being a serial killer; uses his new and improved shield bracelet, which is pretty bad-ass; uses Little Chicago for some seriously cool surveillance; runs into Elaine… again; gets shot in the back; has a flashback to a ghoul attack at Luccio’s Warden Boot Camp in New Mexico; soul gazes Helen Beckitt and sees her daughter’s death; scares the shit out of his apprentice, Molly Carpenter, who keeps veiling herself and following him; mounts a pretty ballsy assault on the White Court; saves Lara Raith’s life; loses the shade of Lasciel, which (whom?) he had dubbed Lash; surrenders Lasciel’s coin to Father Forthill; follows Thomas and learns the secret of his feeding and source of income… aaand pokes a bit of fun.

Fave quotes:

“Do all wizards whine this much?” ~Murphy

‘We fled. I’m not too manly to admit it. We scampered, retreated, vamoosed, amscrayed.’

‘I hate it when the real world ignores a perfectly logical, rational assumption.’

‘I carefully did not lose my temper and barbecue her stupid face right then and there.’

‘I screamed in order to summon up my primal reserves and to intimidate Madrigal into missing me and definitely not because I was terrified.’

“Who’s a grumpy wizard in the morning?” ~Carlos to Harry

“I. Am not. Yoda!” ~Harry to Molly

“My mouth is partially paralyzed. It makes it hard for me to read. He’s here to help me with the big words. Tell me if I’m supposed to push or pull on doors, that kind of thing.” ~Harry talking to security guard about Mouse

“I’d been planning the little ball-of-face-melty-sunshine thing for awhile now.” ~Harry to Murphy

‘Murph sat beside me, not saying anything, not accusing me of anything, she just sat with me. Friends do that.’

‘Dammit, Harry, ignore your penis before it gets you killed.’ ~Harry to self

“Tonight you will be visited by three spirits. The ghosts of indictments of past, present, and future. They will teach you the true meaning of ‘you are still a scumbag criminal’.” ~Harry to Marcone

Check out my other Dresden Files reviews: