This could really be marked as a retro review as I first read this quite some time ago, but having obtained a good price on the complete set of paperbacks in the Prime Day sale I have actually re-read this one so it should go into my monthly stats!
You know how I have a weakness for a nice set of matching paperbacks - the difficulty here is deciding what order to put them in as some of the novellas are published out of sequence to the internal chronology…
Anyway, back to the where it all began and I have to say that this still stands very well as a fantasy novel in its own right. What does impress me is the that the fantasy world pretty much all exists right from the start. There isn’t much that is introduced in the later novels, certainly no new “mechanics” or radically different creature classes, all the basics of the world are mapped out pretty well here. Later novels introduce minor variations and embellish it but the essential world building is all right here.
I went to a talk recently with Adrian Tchaikovsky and Peter F. Hamilton and both of them said that they spent a lot of time world building and planning before embarking on the actual writing journey. That may well be one reason for their success, and it looks like Ben follows the same path (and here’s me thinking that an author just sits down one day and starts bashing away at their keyboard…)
You know the multiple story lines here - the riotous spirit of London personified and causing mayhem where it will, battling genuis locii of the upper and lower Thames and our cast of supporting characters getting their first outing - Mollie, Dr. Walid, Frank Caffery and best of all DCI Seawoll.
It is good, complex and meaty story that moves along at a cracking pace and manages to combine realistic police procedure with the supernatural and reaches a satisfying conclusion but leaves open plenty more to explore, as we do over the next 12 (and counting) novels, not to mention the graphic novels…