I’ve seen The Dresden Files books around but never bothered to pick them up. I’d come across a book in the series at Half Price Books and think “Hm, should try this out sometime. I will when I find the first book.” I never looked hard, but finally this weekend I came across Storm Front. So I coughed up my $3.50 or so, and decided to let Mr. Dresden have his wicked way with me. Well, while Storm Front didn’t exactly wow me with its awesomeness, I can see why it’s as popular as it is.
It’s not breathtakingly good work, but it is solid, entertaining and has the potential to be great series. The Private Investigator set-up naturally lends itself to a long series, provided the main character is interesting and the author is good enough. The series has been going for 15 books now, and has been made into a TV show. So, I think it’s safe to say that Dresden is here to stay for a while. I’m not going to object.
Harry Dresden is interesting, I think, because he’s a poor slob who just happens to be a wizard. And I mean the poor and slob parts quite literally. In Storm Front the man is so hard up for cash he doesn’t even have money to buy light bulbs for his apartment. He also ends up doing some investigating in cowboy boots, sweats, bad t-shirt, and a duster. I don’t get the duster thing. I’m assuming that’s explained at some point further in the books. Is it just a general rule that all bad-asses must have a duster? Is it written in to the Good Guy Kick Ass Code of Conduct? Anyways…
The pace is nice and fast. The repartee is more half-wit than witty, but funny nonetheless. Butcher’s description of the action scenes really bring it into vivid clarity in your mind, without him feeling the need to go overboard on details. I think I prefer urban fantasy to high fantasy for this aspect alone. Urban fantasy writers – perhaps because they don’t have to build a new world – tend to avoid word vomit, on the whole. I almost wrote ‘hole’ there, thankfully I realized that’d give a whole different disgusting image and fixed it. Of course I just talked about said disgusting image now, so I’m sure it’s in your head. Sorry.
Overall, The Dresden Files isn’t a series that I’m super eager to pursue, but good enough I’ll keep an eye out. You know, those books you’ll buy whenever you see, but you don’t actively go looking for? Like that. If you like detective stories, it’ll probably make you happen. If you like detective stories and urban fantasy, it’ll definitely make you happy. Looking for a gorgeous hunky wizard to lust over……er… well, good luck with that. But, hey, thus far no love triangles!
