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An exceptionally fun urban fantasy of the “magic in a modern city” type, as opposed to “my supernatural boyfriend” type, written by a TV writer whose credits include Doctor Who.
Peter Grant is a smartass rookie cop in London whose life changes dramatically when the sole witness to a decapitation murder turns out to be a ghost whom only he can see.
The plot is not exactly strikingly original, but the narration and atmosphere are outstanding. What makes me dislike a lot of urban fantasy is that it’s clearly supposed to be witty, but isn’t. This novel is full of quotable bits of very authentic cynical cop humor, and often made me laugh aloud. I suggest reading the first chapter, if you have an e-reader, to see if you too like the voice.
I can’t vouch for the authenticity of the London setting or of Grant’s West African heritage, but within the novel itself, both are vivid and believable. His London absolutely feels like a real city that you visit for the space of the novel, multicultural and sprawling and full of the little details people who love their hometown know.
The magic and magical beings, again, are not terribly original, but done extremely well, with humor and cleverness. The supporting characters are fun, sketched in bright strokes— I especially liked Grant’s mentor and a family of river spirits. This is a real craftsman’s book.
Note that it contains some gruesome murder scenes, including one with a dead baby. (The dead baby is not graphically described.) They’re not gratuitous and they’re essential to the plot, but as a murder mystery, it’s on the gritty rather than the cozy side. That being said, it’s overall a cheerful, playful book, not one where rocks fall and everyone dies.
I think it would appeal to fans of Steven Brust’s Vlad Taltos series. It also reminded me a bit of Neil Gaiman’s Neverwhere, but Peter Grant is a much more interesting protagonist than Richard Mayhew.
There are two more books in the series, but the first, at least, stands alone. I will definitely read the sequels.
Midnight Riot
Peter Grant is a smartass rookie cop in London whose life changes dramatically when the sole witness to a decapitation murder turns out to be a ghost whom only he can see.
The plot is not exactly strikingly original, but the narration and atmosphere are outstanding. What makes me dislike a lot of urban fantasy is that it’s clearly supposed to be witty, but isn’t. This novel is full of quotable bits of very authentic cynical cop humor, and often made me laugh aloud. I suggest reading the first chapter, if you have an e-reader, to see if you too like the voice.
I can’t vouch for the authenticity of the London setting or of Grant’s West African heritage, but within the novel itself, both are vivid and believable. His London absolutely feels like a real city that you visit for the space of the novel, multicultural and sprawling and full of the little details people who love their hometown know.
The magic and magical beings, again, are not terribly original, but done extremely well, with humor and cleverness. The supporting characters are fun, sketched in bright strokes— I especially liked Grant’s mentor and a family of river spirits. This is a real craftsman’s book.
Note that it contains some gruesome murder scenes, including one with a dead baby. (The dead baby is not graphically described.) They’re not gratuitous and they’re essential to the plot, but as a murder mystery, it’s on the gritty rather than the cozy side. That being said, it’s overall a cheerful, playful book, not one where rocks fall and everyone dies.
I think it would appeal to fans of Steven Brust’s Vlad Taltos series. It also reminded me a bit of Neil Gaiman’s Neverwhere, but Peter Grant is a much more interesting protagonist than Richard Mayhew.
There are two more books in the series, but the first, at least, stands alone. I will definitely read the sequels.
Midnight Riot
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Female characters very rarely meet with that sort of fate and survive, so I was surprised and cautiously pleased that Aaronovitch went there. Once we saw that her face had been damaged, I assumed that there was no way she was going to live.
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I think so. She definitely has her own journey too.
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GOD, YES .....then again so is a sack of wet cement, hah.
What really made this book for me -- and the following ones -- was Peter's voice, and there was a good review elseweb (can't remember where now) that pointed out altho Peter obviously finds women (very) sexy, he's very respectful of them at the same time. But not at all in a very Obvious preachy way.
(I also seriously want Molly to get her own spinoff, or backstory, or something. MOLLY.)
The sequels weren't quiiiite as good, I thought -- the second suffers a bit from second-novel-itis where there's a lot of catchup and explaining, and part of why I loved the first book was its very light exposition. It wasn't quite as tightly plotted as the first book, either, where everything came together so well in that last journey. But I liked it a lot thematically -- it reminded me of later Buffy, when monsters got souls, too. The third book still wasn't quite as good as the first, but LESLEY, and I definitely got the sense of it as a series -- it wasn't just one book after another taking place in the same world, each is building on the next, which I also really like.
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Also there was some flap about the US covers -- the UK ones have gorgeous artwork based on a kind of politically aware map artwork (didn't study it in detail), but the US ones had a guy in SILHOUETTE, because God forbid you would be able to tell the book had a mixed-race narrator. I mean, compare and contrast: http://bookyurt.com/wp-content/uplo
Then again, the UK editions have this really awful blurb comparing them to Harry Potter. WTF?
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The third's gone to the UK covers.
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Yeah, the UK covers are gorgeous. I guess publishers thought US readers wouldn't be interested in London maps? (But we're reading books set in London....)
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Also, because I didn't see it mentioned in these comments yet: MAMA THAMES.
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BEVERLEY
TY....I kind of even like Ty. She's great in the third book, I thought.
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Which is interesting, because it means (a) each book has a different plot problem for me and (b) I still like them.
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It'll be interesting to see what's up with the Big Series Plot in the next couple of books. There's a theme of breaking out of old structures, or resurrecting/changing dead ones, but with that plot you really see the flip side of it -- which is also nice because in the Matthew Swift books frex, it sort of seemed just like "I'm Matthew Swift and I'm here to shake you up and make Philip Marlowe quips and be more awesome than the law." But this series reminded me a bit of the "hedge witchery" in the Magician King -- there's a reason messing with power/magic has rules. I bet we're going to see more of that in the Nightingale backstory, if it comes out.
....also these little pop math quizzes in the captcha are sort of sending me back to third grade. "What's twelve times fourteen??" "UH."
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Also, I like that Leslie is a colleague and rival (she's established as professionally better than Peter), and not a woman-there-to-be-the-romantic-interest.
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As other people have told you, it's called Rivers of London on the other side of the pond, and the series is generally called the Rivers of London series. Also as other people have told you, Leslie comes roaring back in the third book, kicks ass, takes names, continues to be better than Peter at various aspects of policing. However, the fact that she's suffered a terribly disfiguring injury isn't ignored. Aaronovitch deals well with Leslie's injury, to my mind. She's understandably traumatized by it and it causes some ructions in her friendship with Peter, but she doesn't go from promising young copper to Victim.
I had some trouble with the sequels in that there's a longterm plot arc that's not solved in either Book 2 or Book 3. So neither of them stands alone as well as the first one, even though they're still well-written. I think Aaronovitch had a good idea having a longterm plot arc alongside the plot of each book, an arc which doesn't get tidied up neatly at the end of each book. But there are a few stumbles in execution as he transitions from standalone to series books.
I thought Book 3 was better than Book 2, and not just because Leslie has such a big role. But you need to have read Book 2 to understand Book 3. And Book 2 has a hilariously hysterical extended scene that is worth the cover price alone. You will not stop giggling over that scene, even if the book as a whole is uneven.