Whispers Underground by Ben Aaronovitch

Whispers Underground is the third of the Folly series by Ben Aaronovitch, an urban fantasy series chronicling the adventures (Midnight Riot and Moon Over Soho) of bi racial London police constable and apprentice magician; Peter Grant.

This time around the body belonging to the son of a wealthy US politician turns up dead in the London Underground, and once Peter discovers a whiff of vestigial (trace of magic) on it, it’s up to him, his partner Lesley May, and their guv’nor Nightingale to find out whodunit and bring the culprit to justice. They’re aided and abetted, occasionally hindered, by an eager, shoot first FBI agent; Reynolds, the foul mouthed Chief Inspector Seawoll, newly promoted DCI Miriam Stephanopoulos, and the urban explorer and member of the British Transit Police Jaget Kumar. There are also cameos from some of London’s river goddesses (I’m sure Lady Tyburn is going to become very important in the future, if she isn’t already), Dr Walid, and the cheeky pre teen Abigail. Of course Nightingale’s loyal servant Molly (still not sure what she is) and Peter’s dog Toby also reappear.

I look forward to Folly books every bit as much, maybe more, as I do to a new Harry Dresden or Toby Daye, now. If you have any idea how much I adore Toby Daye, then you’ll understand how big a statement that is. The Harry Dresden’s do share a few things in common with the Folly books. Both are narrated by magically adept (although Harry’s a fully fledged wizard, and Peter’s in the equivalent of wizard pre school), somewhat sarcastic antagonists. They’re both set in large metropolises and they both put their antagonist in harm’s way for a good chunk of the time. Both Harry and Peter regularly pepper their narration with pop culture references (Peter’s are naturally more British, and I’m not sure if all of them are understood as well by US audiences as they are by UK and Australian ones, although some of the specifically UK ones go over my head, too). Something Harry Dresden’s creator Jim Butcher has done very successfully over the course of the 13 published Harry Dresden adventures is build up a large cast of characters that enable him to lose one for a book or two and not have it matter a lot to his audience. Ben Aaronovitch has also begun to do this. There wasn’t a lot of Dr Walid in Whispers Underground, and I didn’t miss him all that much, come to think of it Nightingale wasn’t as prominent in Whispers Underground as he was in Rivers of London (Midnight Riot in the US) and Moon Over Soho, but there were other characters both old and new who took up the slack. I appreciated more Lesley, and I will never tire of reading about Molly, she doesn’t even have to do anything, but I giggle every time she appears.

To me now, the plot isn’t even that important. I could read Peter’s descriptions of police procedurals (he writes about it so comfortably and knowledgeably that I wonder if Ben Aaronovitch ever actually spent some time in uniform) and his explanations of Britain’s magical history, complete with his own snarky observations, all day.

Then there’s the setting. The author clearly loves London. He writes about it in a way that marries the modern day city with it’s long and colourful past and puts you right there. It becomes more than just a setting.

As with the previous two books Whispers Underground is self contained, you could jump in right here and read without looking at it’s predecessors, although you’ll enjoy it even more if you do read the other two, and come away entirely satisfied. Now having said that, Whispers Underground does reference the earlier works, and some of it is concerned with the investigation of a villain from those books, it also very neatly lays the ground work for the fourth book, currently called Broken Homes and due for release in 2013.

Whispers Underground is wonderful fun and highly entertaining, any book that so amusingly references one of the all time great James Bond quotes gets an A in my book, too!  

Moon Over Soho by Ben Aaronovitch

Earlier this month I read the first of Ben Aaronovitch’s Folly series see review here (Rivers of London UK/Midnight Riot in the US) and thoroughly enjoyed it. Moon Over Soho is the sequel and it fully lives up to the promise shown in it’s predecessor.

Picking up not that long after the events of Rivers of London, Moon Over Soho finds plainclothes London policeman and apprentice wizard Peter Grant still toiling away at his studies and his job, whilst dealing with the fall out from the previous book, mostly the injuries and terrible facial disfiguration suffered by his partner and friend; Leslie Mays. He’s just visited Leslie and not really enjoyed the experience all that much when he receives a call to attend the morgue.

He is confronted by a body that appears to have suffered a heart attack and died. Peter’s not at all sure why the Folly’s regular medical contact; Dr Walid, has called him about this until he hears the notes of the jazz standard ‘Body and Soul’ floating from the corpse. All of a sudden bodies of jazzmen start turning up with two things in common; they die of heart attacks despite age and physical fitness, and ‘Body and Soul' is involved.

Peter’s father is an old jazzman, a former trumpeter commonly known to other members of London’s jazz community as ‘Lord’ Grant due to a comment made by Ray Charles after hearing Richard Grant play one night. That makes this case right up Peter’s alley, and he soon finds himself haunting jazz clubs with one of the victim’s old band mates and finding out that there’s more to his dear old Dad than a long forgotten career wrecked by bad luck, ill health and drug addiction. He also falls under the spell of Simone, the girlfriend of the first dead jazzman to crop up.

The more Peter searches, the more anomalies he turns up, and he finds that following this case and trying to keep himself alive as the fall out from another ongoing series of murders accumulates, is not all that easy, and then there’s the mystery of Simone, she’s not what she seems and what is the bewitching hold she has on her lovers, Peter included, and her love of jazz?

There’s less of the minutiae of police procedure this time, although I found that interesting in the first book, yet the author displays a wealth of knowledge on that subject. He also appears to have done his homework on jazz music and the London jazz scene. Peter is a highly engaging narrator and the books are worth reading for his little deviations into items of historical interest, some things are thrown in by random, or so it seems, but they always turn up to be pertinent to the plot. Aaronovitch has given his protagonist a highly amusing turn of phrase and interesting outlook on things in general. Peter is fast becoming one of my favourite and most interesting urban fantasy heroes.

There’s also some interesting revelations and background given to Peter’s mentor Nightingale and their maid; Molly, who has become an intriguing and strangely endearing peripheral character.

The final part of this book made my jaw drop and the hints of what is to come has insured that I’ll be snapping up the third Folly book; Whispers Under Ground, the second I see it for sale.

Midnight Riot by Ben Aaronovitch

Midnight Riot (published as Rivers of London in the UK, which is a far more apt title to my way of thinking) is the debut novel by former Doctor Who scriptwriter Ben Aaronovitch.

My wife got this book and it’s sequel (Moon Over Soho) months ago and had been raving about it. I only just got around to reading it, and am kicking myself for not making time for it earlier, because it was an excellent story, with plenty of humour, pop culture references and clever subversion of a number of urban fantasy tropes.

For an urban fantasy Midnight Riot is a bit different in a number of ways, firstly it’s not set in the US, it has a male protagonist and he’s biracial.

Peter Grant is a uniformed London cop coming to the end of his mandatory two year period in uniform and is hoping to be transferred to a plainclothes division where he can do some ‘real’ policing, actually catch criminals rather than do data entry, attend minor disturbances and stand guard around crime scenes. That is until he happens to meet Nicholas Wallpenny a witness to an unusual murder. Unusual in that the victim’s head appeared to have been knocked off the body. Unfortunately for Peter, Nicholas Wallpenny is not your standard witness…he’s a ghost. I loved that Peter’s permanently perky partner, and possible love interest; Leslie Mays, doesn’t just dismiss Peter as mad when he tells her about Wallpenny, but actively helps him try and pursue that particular lead in the case. Of course then Peter meets Inspector Nightingale, Britain’s last wizard, and his life is turned upside down.

I’ve never lived in London, but I get the sense that Ben Aaronovitch’s descriptions of the cities geography, in particular it’s many waterways, was spot on. The concept that the rivers themselves have magical beings attached to them, which manifest as normal citizens was intriguing and amusing. The bigger the river, the more powerful the ‘person’. Mother and Father Thames (no relation) are the king pins. Peter and Nightingale soon realise that to get anywhere with their investigation they’ll have to deal with the rivers and their families. This brings the delightful Beverley Brook into the story as a sort of de facto deputy. The post riot scene where she’s busted and told off by her big sister; Fleet, is priceless and a highlight for me.

The writer also appears to have done a good deal of research into the London police force as the novel displays a great deal of knowledge about police procedures and hierachies. There are also odd little excursions into British history, which deal with everything from Sir Isaac Newton (the greatest British wizard) and the origins of Punch and Judy. I know I’ll never look at the nasty little puppet show the same way again after reading Midnight Riot.

The big reveal of the book was well hidden and I certainly never saw it coming, so much so that I let out a gasp of disbelief when I read it. The novel starts out rather breezily in the style of some of more recent amusing British novelists, but progressively turns darker, although it never loses it’s humour or drive at any point. It’s a great debut and I’ll be looking for the name Ben Aaronovitch from now on.

The whole cast of characters: Peter, Nightingale, Leslie, Beverley, Mama Thames, Lady Tyburn and of course Nightingale’s unforgettable maid Molly, were fascinating and well drawn. There are still mysteries around Nightingale (exactly how old is he?) and Molly, I’m still not sure exactly what she is, so plenty of room for Aaronovitch to move. The sequel Moon Over Soho is out and a third book is planned.