Storm Front - Jim Butcher

A few years ago, my friend tried loaning me the Dresden Files audio books, and I listened to this one at that time, since it was the first in the series. I didn’t dislike it, but audio books don’t really work for me, in that I can’t give them my full attention. If I’m sitting listening to something – podcast, music, whatever – I feel I can be do something else, too. So I do. I still picked up the major points of the story, but I wouldn’t say it had my undivided attention the way it would if I was reading it (through no fault of James Marsters, who was reading for the audio books, I hasten to add). I don’t know if that makes me a good auditory learner or a bad one, frankly (and another factor, I’m pretty sure I can read most books faster than the audio version will go).

Undaunted, my friend sent me several of the books, so it’s time for another go. Like I said, I remembered the overall gist of the story. Harry Dresden is an openly practicing wizard, but like most fictional private eyes, it doesn’t do a great job paying the bills. Then he gets two cases nearly simultaneously; one is a woman, Monica Sells, worried about her missing husband, and the other is the Chicago P.D., worried about a man and a woman found together with their hearts ripped from their chests. Harry has to figure out how someone could even manage that, but the White Council, an oversight board for wizards near as I can tell, is convinced he already knows how, because they think he did it, and using magic to kill is a no-no (one Dresden already did once, allegedly in self-defense). Trying to research how to do it is not the sort of thing that helps one’s protestations of innocence.

It really is very much a detective novel, just one with magic and the supernatural added in. Harry had a kind of rough childhood, some bad mentor figures, an abrasive relationship with authority, a bit more idealism than he likes to let on, a deep dislike of bullies, and the willingness to do stupid, rash things when he gets tired of being pushed. He can’t seem to help making enemies of people, and only some of the times is he able to work his way out of it. Which isn’t a bad thing, taking a familiar thing and using it to help ground something a little stranger. It’s a nice contrast between the things we might know from our everyday world – spouses up and leaving, turf wars between gangs – and the stuff we aren’t used to. Like faeries as the snitches one turns to when they need information quickly. The mystery itself wasn’t any great shakes, there aren’t a lot of false leads or chances to make a guess as to who is behind it all, but Butcher had to establish the ground rules a bit, and Harry spends most of the book as the prime suspect in other characters’ minds, which lessens the chance to jump to conclusions.

One thing I will be curious to see is if Butcher goes into why Harry chose this path. He notes he’s the only openly practicing wizard in the country, which makes me wonder why that’s the case. Is it too dangerous to be so open about your abilities, or just considered kind of gauche? Although, I don’t know how all those other wizards make a living, so maybe it was as simple as Harry having no other marketable skills.