Scan barcode
A review by eesh25
Death Masks by Jim Butcher
4.0
3.75 Stars
Okay, I can finally say that I like a Dresden book. It's not perfect and I'm not remotely ready to call myself a fan of the series, but I finally have a book that I mostly enjoyed. It also only got a 3 on the "Fuck You" counter (see this review for the origin of the counter). That means Butcher is finally learning to write women as human beings. Good for you, sir!
The danger in this book is more... well, dangerious than ever. Harry is still trying to deal with what happened with Susan when a new threat surfaces. We don't know where it's coming from and why, just that someone's trying to do something bad with some very deadly creatures, and an important magical object has been stolen that Harry's been hired to find and retrieve. Oh and, someone's trying to kill him. That's not exactly a development unique to this book but it's more serious this time around. And that was interesting. Like, I can't say that I feared for Harry's life since this series has a million books, but I was definitely curious to see how he would get out of it.
The pace of the book was good too. There were a lot of, mostly connected, things going on. The book lost me a tiny bit in the middle and I'm not sure why. And yeah, Harry still isn't someone I like. He's become more tolerable, though.
I also really liked some of the side characters. Michael's back and we learned more about the Knights of the Cross, which I loved. The new supernatural creature of the book was super interesting and I wanna know and see more of them. The politics of the various courts and councils were great, though they'd be even better if Harry was less annoying when dealing with them. In fact, the series as a whole would really benefit if it stopped trying so hard to make Harry cool and likable. He's not.
Overall, this was a good installment and I will be continuing with the series. Will probably get to the next book in a couple of months. Fingers crossed that I like it even more than this one.
Okay, I can finally say that I like a Dresden book. It's not perfect and I'm not remotely ready to call myself a fan of the series, but I finally have a book that I mostly enjoyed. It also only got a 3 on the "Fuck You" counter (see this review for the origin of the counter). That means Butcher is finally learning to write women as human beings. Good for you, sir!
The danger in this book is more... well, dangerious than ever. Harry is still trying to deal with what happened with Susan when a new threat surfaces. We don't know where it's coming from and why, just that someone's trying to do something bad with some very deadly creatures, and an important magical object has been stolen that Harry's been hired to find and retrieve. Oh and, someone's trying to kill him. That's not exactly a development unique to this book but it's more serious this time around. And that was interesting. Like, I can't say that I feared for Harry's life since this series has a million books, but I was definitely curious to see how he would get out of it.
The pace of the book was good too. There were a lot of, mostly connected, things going on. The book lost me a tiny bit in the middle and I'm not sure why. And yeah, Harry still isn't someone I like. He's become more tolerable, though.
I also really liked some of the side characters. Michael's back and we learned more about the Knights of the Cross, which I loved. The new supernatural creature of the book was super interesting and I wanna know and see more of them. The politics of the various courts and councils were great, though they'd be even better if Harry was less annoying when dealing with them. In fact, the series as a whole would really benefit if it stopped trying so hard to make Harry cool and likable. He's not.
Overall, this was a good installment and I will be continuing with the series. Will probably get to the next book in a couple of months. Fingers crossed that I like it even more than this one.