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A review by leesmyth
War in Heaven by Charles Williams
4.0
I liked it a lot overall, the twists and turns - it's got elements of murder mystery and detective story, a comedy of manners, and then a bit of demonic possession for the horror genre. Two of the villains are a bit stereotyped for modern tastes, and their evil scheme is perhaps somewhat underwhelming, but otherwise it works if you don't mind everything getting all entangled with the supernatural.
The opening scene is a lot of fun, as is the best-developed villain and his amoral collaborator. And the good guys do a glorious bit of social engineering at one point to evade the villains.
But perhaps my favorite scene is one where three members of London's police force are trying to get to a particular address. The underlings haven't been able to find it, so the Big Cheese heads out to see what's going on:
The opening scene is a lot of fun, as is the best-developed villain and his amoral collaborator. And the good guys do a glorious bit of social engineering at one point to evade the villains.
But perhaps my favorite scene is one where three members of London's police force are trying to get to a particular address. The underlings haven't been able to find it, so the Big Cheese heads out to see what's going on:
At what he hoped was the corner of Lord Mayor's Street he ran directly into a stationary figure.(ch. 16, p. 261)
"What the hell——" he began. "Sorry, sir. Oh, it's you, Pewitt. Damnation, man, why don't you shout instead of knocking me down? All right, all right. But standing at the corner of the street won't find the house, you know. Where's the constable? Why don't you keep together? Oh, he's here, is he! Couldn't even one of you look for the house instead of holding a revival meeting at the street corner? Now for God's sake don't apologize or I shall have to begin too, and we shall look like a ring of chimpanzees at the Zoo. I know as well as you do that I'm in a vile temper. Come along and let's have a look. Where's the grocer's?"
He was shown it. Then, he first, Pewitt second, and the constable last, they edged along the houses, their torches turned on the windows. "That's the grocer's," the Commissioner went on. "And here—this blasted fog's thicker than ever—is the end of the grocer's, I suppose; at least it's the end of a window. Then this must be the confectioner's. I believe I saw a cake; the blind's only half down. And here's a door, the confectioner's door. Didn't you think of doing it this way, Pewitt?"
"Yes, sir," Pewitt said, "the constable and I have done it about seventeen times."