Books: Foxglove Summer By Ben Arronovitch (2014)

“Following the events Broken Homes, Peter Grant is left shaken by the new developments that revealed a betrayal of a long-time colleague. The defection by this valued partner -to whom Grant also had a strong emotional tie-, has made things difficult for him and Nightingale. But the sudden disappearance of two eleven-year old girls in rural Herefordshire has become a media sensation. Given the chance to escape bad memories of London, Grant travels west with Beverley Brook, and Peter soon finds himself caught up in a deep mystery and having to tackle local cops and things that small towns seem to thrive on; a tangle of neighborly gossip, local marital issues, and local gods. And everything, it appears, closes up at 4pm!”

With the fifth book in the series, Foxglove Summer puts most events of the last four books on the backburner, as we get your basic tale of a Big City cop out in the sticks of the deep, deep suburbs. As your fish out of water story goes, you could do worse. Aaronovitch understands what he’s doing here, and while the basic plot is nothing new, we get more dimensions from Peter when he spends the entire book outside the Folly and Nightingale -who spends the entire book just communicating with Peter via the phone. There is a logical reason for this, but I sort of missed him.

I noted the pacing issues with Broken Homes (all the books seem to have this problem, which was probably why I read the first book in 2016 and did not continue on until this past year), but Foxglove Summer seems to be a more cohesive story, if only because this book had one real storyline going for it instead of multiple ones the previous ones had. Yes, we get Lesley sending antagonizing texts (and a quick phone call) and there is no visit from the Faceless Man, but this episodic book actually worked better than the more serialized four books previous.

What was also striking –and probably why I end up reading more British mysteries than American- is how everything is dealt more matter-of-factly. The child-in-jeopardy trope never felt cheap, as the cops asked more straightforward questions and gave truthful answers that most American parents would be shocked at.

We get a bunch of new characters that I hope stick around. While Beverly Brooks appeared in the first book, here she is more three-dimensional and more interesting. But new ones include Hugh Oswald, a retired wizard, traumatized by the secret magical battles of World War II, and Mellissa, his granddaughter who has a very special affinity with bees. Oswald is a sad and distinctive character and the granddaughter a bit weird. Loved Dominic, the cop assigned to help Peter. He’s gay and has a farmer boyfriend and no one in this little hamlet seems to have an issue with him or Victor.   

Peter’s trademark wit remains place, which is a seemly interesting combination of cleverness and dashes of cluelessness. He’s still honorable, despite his cheek and snarky comments, but ultimately remains a good human who happens to be a wizard-in-training.

Book: Broken Homes By Ben Aaronovitch (2013)

 

"A mutilated body in Crawley. Another killer on the loose. The prime suspect is one Robert Weil; an associate of the twisted magician known as the Faceless Man? Or just a common or garden serial killer? Before PC Peter Grant can get his head round the case a town planner going under a tube train and a stolen grimoire are adding to his case-load. So far so London. But then Peter gets word of something very odd happening in Elephant and Castle, on a housing estate designed by a nutter, built by charlatans and inhabited by the truly desperate. Is there a connection? And if there is, why oh why did it have to be South of the River?"

The fourth volume of Aaronovitch’s Rivers of London series, Broken Homes is more pedestrian of the series, even as the book is getting a deeper and richer world. There is some pacing issues here, and the book –more or less- has several different storylines going (which may reflect a real cops life versus one that handles a case at time). Still, Peter continues to be a fully realized character, and even seems to somewhat more mature here (less wise-cracks, but he is still the smartass), especially in the latter third of the novel where the humor and jokes become less and less and the drama kicks in.

There is a twist at the end, which I did not see coming and am curious where this will go in the next book. I’m a bit tired of the betrayal trope, and it seemly comes out of nowhere (though, I guess, this would mean re-reading the first three to see if Aaronovitch was setting things up). So while Broken Homes follows the same basic set-up as the previous three, it also felt like “filler”, with a meandering plot and surprise ending designed to lengthen the series. It all feels like a set up for book five and to get there, Aaronovitch needed to put a bunch of disconnected ideas here to get to next book.

I mean, a lot goes on, yet it also felt like not much went on. Weird, I know.