I have been sitting on writing this one for a bit to try and let my feeling settle. But you know, I'm not so good at that. This is going to be a long one, so prepare however you feel fit. The following review is a two-fer for Peace Talks and Battle Ground (with bits touching on the whole series), the latest two books in the Dresden Files series. It will give heavy spoilers for pretty much everything including character deaths, so if you haven't caught up and care about that kind of thing, this is your last chance to turn back.
Some background: I have been a fan of this series for ages. When I started the series there were only five books in it, and Battle Ground is the seventeenth. I have all of them on audiobook, and when I was working at my first post-graduate position, I would listen to them pretty much on repeat. Before Peace Talks, I would have told you that the second book (Fool Moon) was the worst in the series, and the one that I've only returned to twice. I would have warned you that the first two books are rough, and he hits his stride in book three (Grave Peril). If there weren't major characters and recurring plot points introduced for the first time in it, I would have undoubtedly recommended that you skip it. I say this to let you know that I'm coming at this from a fan of both the genre and the series, because this is going to be harsh.
Peace Talks is the worst book in the series. I read it in July when it released, and when I went to read Battle Ground this month, I couldn't remember any major points in it. It's like my brain smoothed it away because it was so inconsequential, so poorly characterized, so nonsensical, and so poorly written and pieced together that I just dropped all that information.
Peace Talks is NOT the book you want to release after a six-year hiatus within the series. Actually, I shouldn't say that, Brief Cases released two years ago, but it's a collection of short stories that were already released, save the last one (Zoo Story). Brief Cases was where the rumblings of unease started for me.
It features 12 short stories, a few of which were from other character's POV, something Butcher has dabbled with throughout the series. It's always interesting to see what an author does with another character's voice, and it enables us to see how unique the main character may or may not be. One was from Luccio's POV, and was good, if not terribly exciting. One from Marcone's POV, which gave us a little more insight into his inner circle (Hendricks being an English major cracked me up, not going to lie). And two were from Molly's POV, after she's become the Winter Lady. And oh. Wow. Uh. They're something, all right.
Butcher does NOT know what to do with a young female character's POV. At all. Both are weirdly obsessed with the fatality of her new powers, only as it pertains to sex. He wants you to know that the Winter Court is ALL ABOUT that deathsex. If your partner isn't mangled to pieces by the end by god, you're not doin' it Winter Style, baby! It comes off as gross and unnecessary (especially the part where she blacks out and doesn't even remember having sex, so she didn't even get to remember her own pleasure, cool cool), and feels like we're setting up that the only TRUE partner that Molly can have is someone who's her equal. Someone else who understands. Harry. And I can't. They will make a terrible couple. And that makes a lovely segue!
Harry Dresden has a death penis. That would be enough for him to remain celibate, but also he's goddamn terrible in relationships. For 17 books, my OTP has been Harry/his left hand because there's no happy or functional outcomes for the women in his life. And honestly, he's a bit of a tool, and a lot of a sexist, so no, he shouldn't inflict that on another person. He's nearly always measured women in these books by how attractive they are, and holy shit does that go off the charts in Peace Talks, to the point where when he mentions The Archive, my immediate thought was DO NOT! TELL ME! HOW SEXY SHE IS, HARRY! NO. You met her when she was FIVE, ffs, DON'T. Thank fuck he doesn't, but I wonder how much of that is how inessential she is to this story, and how little contact he has with her.
And that's the problem with Peace Talks: there's too much going on, and also not enough going on. Every character he's ever looked at makes an appearance, and few of them really need to be included. The whole novel feels like it only starts to come together in the last third of the book, like it's a half a story (and it ends just like that too, like they had enough actual cohesive plot for one book, but for some reason didn't edit it into one). I told friends who hadn't read it yet to just wait because there's no reason to dangle on that cliffhanger because it was so unsatisfying. Personal lowpoints from Peace Talks:
- Everything with the Wardens. Harry's stupid attitude with them. Their hostility, when they've worked with him extensively before. Carlos feels like a wholly different character, which you could chalk up to his trauma after being death-fucked by Molly in Brief Cases (again, WHY?!), but I don't have the confidence in Butcher right now to give him that credit.
- Harry/Murphy, particularly the sex scene. Yikes.
- Murphy taking off her casts (that's not how ANYTHING WORKS, HOLY SHIT).
- Ebenezer. His one-note, one objection complaints about Thomas.
- Harry fucking up his arrangements with the Svartalves.
- The pregnancy subplot in general with Thomas and Justine. I am just so tired of babies being the impetus in the stories of men. Now we have to grow up because we are going to be a Father. Come on.
- On that note, Maggie seems completely superfluous in this story. She's what, 10, almost 11? And he writes her like a four-year-old. I get that she's been traumatized, but that said, she's almost infantilized.
- Harry's reaction to Butters' polycule. Gross. Grow up, Harry.
He puts odd amounts of emphasis on things that don't actually matter to the plot, while dropping long-awaited reveals with casualness and no particular time dedicated to actually exploring it. We have a soulgaze with a minor character introduced in the last book for no reason, and oh, Mac's an Angel, probably. Bye! It's vitally important that we know that Rudolph's partner is a stand-up steady kinda guy, oh, and Marcone's a Denarian. NBD.
Speaking of soulgazes, how the FUCK do you sleep with someone multiple times and have a years-long relationship with them (both romantic and platonic) and NOT soulgaze them? That was so stupid, so profoundly stupid, and his handwave was bullshit.
Here's a minor thing that I took note of, over the years Harry's pop culture references have updated and it's nonsense. Wizards don't do well with technology, so his knowledge of recent-ish movies, tv, and video games should have terminated at about 13 or thereabouts. He was 37 in Cold Front, which makes him a few years older than me, (so that would be like 1990-ish? I was 13 in 1994, and I don't know from which point the wizard technology glitch kicks in, so I'm giving him a couple years leeway) and while they do try to lampshade it a little bit (Bob referencing Firefly after living with Butters, he and Luccio going to the drive-in [but only seeing vintage movies? They only mention Excalibur]), him dropping a Mean Girls reference jangled insanely. When and why and how would he have watched that movie?
I've mentioned it before, but the weakest points here are tone and pacing and holy cow does that come together in Murphy's death scene. Hey guys, while Murphy isn't my favorite character, the death of a major character who's been in every book in the series since the beginning, who the main character is ostensibly in love with should have more impact than none at all. I should have been bawling. Instead she dies in the middle of the book for no reason, and subsequent mentions of her are mainly about her body (and his freakout trying to kill Rudolph, which are at least in character). Hey Harry, don't you suppose you should tell her family? The flatness of the tone could have been redeemed somewhat if we'd had to have a tearful scene with Mama Murphy after the battle. There's a weird lack of relationship to their relationship; like we never see her interact with Maggie after she drops her off at the Carpenter's in Changes. We never allude to him addressing her family after Blood Rites. There's just no development, like a romantic relationship doesn't involve any other humans. I've been with my husband for 19 years, and while we don't consult our families over much, we still talk to them. His parents ask how I am. I tell him what mom's doing. And if one of us died, the other one would have to deal with them, especially if there was no body.
The frustrating thing about these two books is that with a little more effort (I won't say time, because I have no idea how long these sat on the shelf) they could have made a serviceable story. The elements were there. How you can take a story that's (unnecessarily) two books and still make it feel incomplete is absolutely baffling. On a sentence level it's unpolished (I remember a character described as looking grandmotherly with "a grandmother's clothes" and the phrase "a nearly coherent light" WHAT DOES THAT MEAN, JIM?), and there's so much fluff and padding that just didn't need to happen.
In short (HA!), I'm done taking these on faith. After buying all of them on release day, I will be checking any upcoming titles out of the library until he gains back a little of what he lost or someone takes the manuscripts in hand and gets them finished properly. I'm not generally a victim of the sunk-cost fallacy in reading, my TBR is too long to waste my time with things I don't enjoy.
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