Acquire Broken Homes (Peter Grant, #4) Crafted By Ben Aaronovitch Copy
don't read much contemporary urban supernatural fiction, I prefer classic fantasy and big epics set on secondary worlds.
But over the last four books I've grown quite fond of Police Constable Peter Grant I think that's what PC stands for, other than personal computer.
The supporting staff is all right Lesley, Nightingale, Molly, the dog, the doctor, etc but a good series that wants to go the distance ofbooks or more needs a strong, interesting protagonist, somebody the reader can identify with.
The apeal of Peter for me resides mostly in the fact that he is not an uberpowerful magician or an unbeatable martial artist.
He's a regular guy, learning the rules of magic in a slow and often painful way, by constant practice and more errors than successes.
Of course he scores very high on his geek scientist credentials I'm a big fan of the geek TV show Big Bang Theory which, coupled with his passion for arhitecture, jazz and social commentary made his narration of events often more entertaining than the actual criminal investigations he is engaged in.
Speaking of which: Broken Homes is about finding the connection between several apparently unrelated murders, all done using a magical attack of sorts : the corpse of a woman with her face blown off dumped in forest by a country road, the suspicious suicide of a public servant in a London underground station, the improbable heart attack of a real estate auditor, the body of a former crook burned from the inside out.
The last one bears the signature mark of Peter's arch enemy The Faceless Man a powerful rogue wizard, and I appreciated the choice of the author to focus on the main storyline after the third book in the series, which felt more like a filler, like a side quest.
Once again, the city of London comes off the pages in all its arhitectural and multicultural glory, with Peter as its most enthusiatic troubadour.
A rather hideous and derelict high rise tower from the impractical's plays a central part in the story, together with its down on their luck current inhabitants.
I would have lliked to see the River deities introduced at the start of the series play a more central role in the plot development here.
They have a very good scene where they all gather for a Spring festival on the South Bank of Thames, but the episode felt like a distraction from the main plot.
Luckily for me, the magical creatures were better linked to the plot through a new character introduced here : a hamadryad linked to some old trees on the estate I mentioned earlier.
To continue with the positive aspects of this fourth book not that I have anything to complain about, I particularly liked three things:
the introduction of German and Russian magical practicioners, expanding the alternate histories and secret organizations beyond the Folly and the English culture
the big scene of Thomas Nightingale unleashing his magicfu.
I was reminded of the last Star Wars movie when the wise and imperturbable Yoda finally gets to show what a major kickass he really is
a toning down of the goofing around, sarcastic remarks and general levity of Peter.
Things are really getting serious with the Faceless Man, and I found the changes to a darker style appropriate,
Last one I will put in
I now have a YouTube channel that I run with my brother, called 'The Brothers Gwynne'.
Check it out sitelinkThe Brothers Gwynne
Broken Homes follows the same template as the previous three stories in this series.
So, it is interesting, funny and engaging, with a new crime story and thread with the same characters,
Broken Homes had another cleverly constructed case that allowed growth and development of character, But, whilst I think that momentum dropped a bit in the middle, so it was a bit flat for a while, that ending! What a twist.
Best ending to the series so far in my opinion,
As this is the fourth instalment in the series, there is not much I can say without spoilers, so I will keep this short, The central characters are being explored more and more, with Peter Grant still acting as a very good perspective to view the world from.
But the plot was weaker in my opinion, which meant that character development, the introducing of new figures, and the tension was just lacking, until the last phase of the story.
Despite some of these aspects that diminished my enjoyment at times, it was a really great ending, and still an enjoyable read.
So, I will be continuing with this series, but I do not know when,
./STARS I have returned to the urban fantasy world of PC Peter Grant based at The Folly, and a wonderful police procedural series set in underground magical London.
It has a great sense of location in London and makes the most of the buildings and character of the city.
We have the policing of the Spring Court, attended by the major river gods with all the attendant festivities and stalls.
There are the undercurrents apparent between Peter and Beverly Brook, a slow heating romance in the making, Lesley is switching between two different face masks after the damage she incurred to her face,
Apparently random events occur which end up with Peter, and his partner Lesley, Robert Weil is involved in a fatal traffic accident, His name sets off bells with Peter and it leads to a woman shot in the face, whose body is discovered in Crawley.
Sergeant Jaget Kumar of the British Transport Police draws Peter's attention to the strange apparent suicide of Richard Lewis at an underground station.
Lewis was a planner at Southwark Council, Thief and burglar, Patrick Mulkern's corpse is discovered in Bromley, burnt from the inside out, Then there is the odd heart attack that kills the young Richard Dewsbury, a real estate auditor, A stolen German Grimoire leads to Eric Stromberg, the architect of Skygardens, a council estate imbued with industrial magic and the focus of conflict between developers and residents who desire to remain.
Peter and Lesley end up living on the estate as they delve deeper into the mysteries there, We encounter a Russian nightwitch, and Nightingale proves his mettle at a battle on a farm, All the incidents turn out to be connected and there is a shocker of a twist in the finale,
This was a great read with a mixed pacing that mirrors the action in the different parts of the novel.
Peter is an outstanding and complex character who is determined and full of initiative, He is supported by a brilliant cast of characters, magical and otherwise, Once again, the Faceless Man proves to be a powerful, menacing and challenging adversary to both Peter and Nightingale, I so enjoyed reading this and I recommend this series without reservation,
If you've read any other Broken Homes reviews or checked out the range of ratings, you'll know that opinion on this book runs the gamut.
For me, Aaronovich is starting to feel like he is coming into his own, It's mature, developed writing with rich characters and a thoughtfully developed magic and supernatural
system, Without doubt, pacing is a little off from a traditional detective story, but I found that for me, it reflected the inconsistent nature of reallife police work one does not work a case to the exclusivity of all others, and sometimes the pieces are slow to fit into place.
The result is a plot that is a little more "day in the life" until it gestalts together at the end, but was an enjoyable tour on the way.
If you want nicely sophisticated characters, sly humor and an insider's view to England, this is an excellent installment in a quality urban fantasy detective series.
The summary: Peter and Leslie are at the Folly, developing their magic skills and researching an Oxford University dining club group that was learning magic a couple of decades ago.
Research is interrupted when they're called to an unusual car accident that resulted in one of the driver's deaths, Blood in the back seat leads them to another dead bodystrangely missing a face, It sets off vague internal alarms, but with nothing clear to go on, Peter continues on with his mandatory Officer Safety training.
As someone who was required to attend annual recertifications every year, I found his asides on the usual dry dust mandatory topics to be snortworthy:
"The morning lecture was on stop and search with reference to spotting suspicious behavior.
. . he did warn us to make an exception for tourists, because London needed the foreign currency, "
There's a sidebar with a River peace summit and a cameo with the Folly cadet, giving more insight into the complicated nature of supernatural politics.
At one point in the case, Peter and Leslie go undercover at an estate project housing, giving a very unique glimpse from a police perspective into the local human denizens.
"I know trouble when it's below the age of criminal responsibility, and while my first instinct was to arrest his parents on general principles, I gave him a cheery wave instead.
"
I was really enjoying the mischievous, dry wit until about pageor so when Aaronvitch started to become quite serious.
The wit was still there, but more sly, less frequent, letting the reader focus on the impact of the story.
I found it refreshing although I love a snarky remark, at a certain point, they become incongruent with the emotion of the story.
Honestly, I can't say enough, I love Aaronvich's tone and style, I love that his dogs are dogs, but are still amusing that Peter is not an antihero, and as wry as he is, still believes in loyalty and justice that Peter doesn't describe all women in terms of sexability, just the ones he wants to have sex with that magic isn't easy that magic is part of an ambient system living all around us that Peter is selfdepreciating as much as he chaffs others.
Add to it that unlike most UF books, the police are not bumbling idiots or obstructive foils, and you have a UF detective read with a very different flavor.
I think it is also worth noting that these books have high reread potential, sitelinkIlona Andrews recently noted "a writer can teach the readers pretty much anything through the narrative, but the lower is that starting threshold, the wider is the audience.
" Aaronovich doesn't handhold the reader, resulting in a higher threshold, He uses London slang, British police vocabulary, architectural terms and stories that are heavily influenced by local geography, Yet, I feel so satisfied after reading his works, This ending especially was a gobsmacker, I wouldn't call it a cliffhanger, exactly, since I'm pretty confident in his characterizations and Peter's reflections, I think Aaronovich's tv roots are showing, and it's more of a titillating leadin to the next installment, There's a reason I've made an effort to get the series in hardcoverI want them around for a long time.
Laughs:
"Arts and Antiques, definitely not known by the rest of the Met as the Arts and Crafts squad, occasionally recover an item so valuable that even the evidence storage locker in the middle of New Scotland Yard isn't secure enough.
"
"I said she could have a look around the fair as long as she didn't talk to any strange people.
'Okay,' she said,
'Or strange things,' I said,
'Whatever,' she said and skipped off,
'Or strange things that are also people,' I called after her, "
"'They're probably waiting for one of us to get freeze dried,' said Lesley, whose attitude towards taser deployment was that people with heart conditions, epilepsy and an aversion to electrocution should not embark upon breaches of the peace in the first place.
" ReRead
Dog Days of Summer
It's time for my summer theme and this year I have chosen to read books that include canine companions.
In that spirit, I'm continuing on with Peter Grant and his faithful canine, Toby, who is integral to the action in this volume.
Toby becomes important cover for Peter and Lesley as they move into Sky Gardens to see if they can figure out what the Faceless Man is up to.
This, although a significant step in the story arc, is probably my least favourite, I know the ending makes sense but I don't have to like it, Despite my reservations, I'm still enjoying this summer rereading spree,
Original
This installment meanders a bit, as it juggles multiple story lines, plus lessons in architecture.
Thomas "Oh was that your Tiger tank" Nightingale gets to show why he's the teacher and Peter amp Lesley are the apprentices.
I particularly enjoyed Toby's increased role in this book, being Peter's magic detector the yapometre and camouflage a man with a dog is virtually invisible, apparently.
Peter has matured since the first book, Lesley gives him a hard time, needling him about why he and Beverly Brook aren't sleeping together yet, In the first couple of books, Peter would have jumped in first and thought things through later, but he has learned to think with his big head and is suitably cautious.
After all, if your relationship with a goddess goes pearshaped, you know who is going to suffer most and it won't be Beverly.
I'm still enjoying the effortless multicultural and inclusive cast of characters, however don't imagine that I have no criticism! I'm not wild about the Faceless Man as an antagonist although I did enjoy Peter's reference to his lab as the Strip Club of Dr.
Moreau. But, having read to the end of this volume, how can I doubt that I will read the next to see the next event in the drama.