Just finished reading Fool Moon by Jim Butcher.

Fool Moon picks up a few months after Storm Front and sees our hero Harry fallen on hard times.  The police are giving him the cold shoulder, following incidents in the last book, and work is very thin on the ground.  That is until a series of grisly murders, all taking place around the time of the full moon, begin to occur and the Special Investigations unit once again call on Harry.

Firstly, I will say that I liked this book but, for some reason, not as much as the first.  Although it won’t put me off continuing with the series because the story and the telling were good just as good.

What I really like about this series so far is Harry.  He is just so very readable.  He’s a magician, but his magic in no way takes over the whole story, in fact it is relatively little used and quite often only as a last resort, he’s witty, I like the way he tells the story and admits to all his little flaws.  He’s certainly not perfect, you could almost accuse him of being patronising to certain people, but, he means well and is genuinley a good guy and frankly a bit of a softie.  What I also like about this series is that it’s got lots going on, particularly in this installment which was action packed.  We are introduced to wolves in this story and there are a number of different varieties, and I’m talking of the supernatural kind and the theories were a different take from the norm which was refreshing.

As I said, there’s plenty of action in Fool Moon accompanied by gore and blood, lots of blood – Dexter would have been in his element! (Blood splatter patterns all over the place.)  There are also a number of different themes and gangs.  We also once again seem to end up in a situation where circumstances keep spiralling ever down from bad to worse to 20 feet below.

I suppose what detracted from this story for me would be a few things.  I felt that Murphy acted just plain weird or stupid – I could have joyfully slapped her (and yet Dresden doesn’t help by withholding information – so slap for him as well), but, nonetheless I found some of her actions a little bit hard to swallow.  I also found the layout of this story very much followed Storm Front.  Harry isn’t working, Harry gets work, Harry gets involved in all sorts of heinous situations pdq, Harry gets beaten up, Harry gets beaten up some more and then when things can’t get any worse Harry saves the day, sounds familiar but just swap the motives a little and involve a different bunch of supernatural critters, bingo.  I don’t have a problem with Harry saving the day btw it’s just that this felt very much as though a formula has been written and will be stuck to – I just hope that’s not the case (okay, I know this sort of novel is a bit like that but this one was just too in your face) and the other thing that sort of irritated me was the romance thing with Susan which feels really forced.  I’m not feeling it at all, in fact I would say there is a deal more chemistry between Harry and Murphy – perhaps that will be developed further in future editions.

On the whole, I enjoyed the book, it’s action packed and quite amusing with a decent plot but I just didn’t like it as much.  It won’t stop me reading the next as I already like Harry and it feels like a fun and indulgent read.

Rating -B

Fool Moon