Summer Knight (The Dresden Files, Book 4)
by Jim Butcher
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Book Reviews of Summer Knight (The Dresden Files, Book 4)
Book Review: These faeries are NOT about sweetness and light....
Summary: 4 Stars
After the first book in the series, Jim Butcher established a pattern in his Harry Dresden novels. In each volume, detective/wizard Dresden faces off against another genus in the family of magical beasties. In the second volume, it was werewolves; in the third, it was vampires. This time around, he is confronted with creatures which (unless you're big on Celtic myth) you may not think of as scary: faeries.These faeries are not (for the most part) sweet little Tinkerbelles or Fantasia-inspired sprites. They are creatures of what Harry calls the Nevernever who are nonetheless closely tied in with the elements of the natural world. In particular, they are connected with the seasons. Still trying to help end the war between wizards and vampires that he helped start at the end of the previous book (without being offered up as a blood sacrifice by the wizards' White Council), Harry gets sucked into a power struggle between the two rival Faerie courts of Summer and Winter. The Summer Knight has been bumped off, his mantle of power stolen, and the Winter Queen, Mab (remember her from Romeo and Juliet?), wants Harry to prove that her side wasn't responsible. In the mean time, Harry's girlfriend has skipped town and his first love unexpectedly appears--but on whose side?
The action in Summer Knight is fast-paced, without being quite as horrific as in Grave Peril (Book 3); nor is it as formulaic as it was in Fool Moon (Book 2). Butcher continues to weave in threads from Harry's past, and to expand the reader's understanding of the parallel universe that Harry inhabits (both in Chicago and in the Nevernever). He returns here to something more closely resembling the gumshoe/whodunit form with which he began the series so wonderfully--a cross (as I have said before) between Dashiell Hammett and JK Rowling. Shakespearean references abound (beginning with the punning title), which Butcher manages to be very sly about... until the very end. Ah, well. All's well that ends well. ;-)
Book Review: Feel liek he never gets a break
Summary: 5 Stars
For the past couple of months or so, I have been indulging myself with The Dresden Files Series. It is pretty much a thriller with a twist. Featuring Harry Dresden, a private detective, who also happened to be the only um... "known" wizard in the mortal world. He also works as a consultant for SI (Special Investigations), which specialised in unsolved cases. He has a ghost who inhabited a skull, named Bob, and a pet cat (that's pretty much abnormal as size), and they live in a basement somewhere in Chicago. The series pretty much pulling me into the story from one book to another and I can't seem to stop! The series, currently, is at it's 11th book in publication. It also has it's own TV Series, if anybody is interested.
So about Summer Knight. The story just continues off from the last book 'Grave Peril', and yes you have to read from the first book cause it would just confuse you if you start reading from middle of nowhere. Harry Dresden faced the White Council for what he did in the last book and is also in the middle of a beginning of a breakdown. (sort of). The Seasons are running havoc, his werewolves friends are his sidekicks, and of course there's a girl involved to make things interesting. To make him more busy, he has to look for a missing girl so he could pay for his rent!
Things I've enjoyed: How the events just won't slow down and fast pace for read. Danger after danger and complication after complication. It's not too much but it's good enough to get through you as a reader and not put it down. Plus Harry just have a good sense of weird humor here and there.
Things I didn't enjoy: Well.. nothing so far.
Reason for reading: I love it! I would like to finish the series hope Jim Butcher won't end it any soon.
Rating: Pretty high. Recommending it to Pre-Us up.
Recommends to: Harry Potter, Laurell K. Hamilton and Tanya Huff fans would love this.
Book Review: Dresden takes on Faeries...
Summary: 4 Stars
Harry Dresden isn't the same after he fights ghosts and vampires in Grave Peril. After Susan leaves town to deal with her new bouts of blood lust, Harry isolates himself from everyone and everything. He has not worked in a long time and is in danger of losing his apartment and his office, but his depression is so strong that he does not care. He hasn't even taken a shower in days! But when the White Council pays him a visit and almost decide to hand over to the vampires, Harry has no choice but to again defend his life. He also has to clean the name of a manipulative faerie who also happens to be the Queen of Air and Darkness. A faerie known as the Summer Knight has been murdered, and Harry has to solve the case to both free himself from the faeries and clear his name for the White Council. There are various twists throughout the novel.
The supernatural beings in this series -- save for the teenage werewolves -- are evil to the core. The faeries, vampires and ghouls are very dark creatures -- nothing benign about these monsters! And that's what makes this series different from the ones authors Laurell K. Hamilton and Charlaine Harris write. Summer Knight is my second favorite book of the Dresden Files (my favorite thus far is Fool Moon). Harry feels like a puppet, for the faeries and the White Council want different things from him. He is more vulnerable in this installment than in the other ones, but still as self-deprecating and goofy as ever. I thought the scene where he tries to speak in Latin to the White Council was hilarious. There are more comic scenes and quips in this installment. The characters are great here, especially Billy and Murphy, and the new characters seem promising. But Michael and Susan are absent in this one. I hope that they will make a comeback soon. I am loving the Dresden Files and I cannot wait to read Death Masks soon.
Book Review: Fair Warning
Summary: 5 Stars
This may be the first Dresden novel you can't follow if you haven't read the prior books. Not that it's inscrutable or that the story is merely an outgrowth of the prior novels. On the contrary, the heart of the story is fresh and vital. But the surrounding context is dependent on information given out in the second and third Dresden novels, and you may be adrift if you can't follow that context. Fair warning.
That said, this is spectacular epic fantasy, with a cast of thousands, a war between magical powers, and the whole human race in the balance. We also learn more about Harry Dresden's past (try to see around the minor inconsistencies), his place in the wizard world, and the pain that drives him. And we see him grow in trust of others, a trait that has been singularly lacking in his character up to this point.
One thing I enjoy about Jim Butcher's writing is his ambition. He doesn't flinch from huge stories that are probably hard to write, and he doesn't fear to hurt characters we have come to love. Too often, in mainstream fantasy, writers play it small and safe. Not Jim Butcher. He takes risks, thrusts himself into the audience's face, and dares us to flinch. And he never falters in his dry, cutting wit.
It might be easy for a celebrity author like Butcher to coast on his success, turning out comfy, predictable pulp like an factory. Too many authors do just that. Yet each Dresden novel continues to impress and challenge me, and I appreciate an author who has that kind of ambition and respect. I've become something of an evangelist for the Dresden Files. Keep reading and see if you don't become one, too.
Book Review: It's magic, again, with the other great wizard Harry!
Summary: 4 Stars
Very very few books that I read in the category of "mind-candy" receive more than 3 stars. Butcher deserved it, and is making me quickly reconsider him as belonging to the mind-candy list at all!The wait for this one was a tremendously hard one for me. I was lucky enough to receive the "teaser" from Mr. Butcher via E-mail, and then had to wait. Wait. Wait. It hurt.
For a fun read, this series - about the only wizard in the Chicago Yellow Pages - leaves nothing to be desired. But this fourth book turned everything on its edge, and was absolutely fabulous. A haggard Harry is trying to cope with everything that went so terribly wrong in the third book - not limited to, but including a very bad turn in his love life, the starting of a wizards-vs-vampires war (oops), and quite a bit of disfavour among the wizard's council. And then of course, the fae come to collect on Harry's debt, old (and once murderous) love interests show up, and before you know it - Harry's hip deep again in trouble.
As always, it's Harry's character that keeps you going (that and his air-spirit-trapped-in-a-crystal-skull sidekick, the oversexed Bob). Harry is such a wonderful guy to follow that you can't help but feel for him, even as his winning chivalry gets him deeper and deeper into mess. The mystery itself in this one - who killed one of the Fairy Court's Knights? - is just as interesting, and the Fairy culture that Butcher wove together is skillfully plotted.
This was superb, and if you liked Anita Blake, or Tanya Huff's "Keeper" series, you'll love Harry Dresden.
'Nathan