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shadowkatOn the way home ran into a police barricade at the LIRR Atlantic Avenue Terminal. They'd blocked off the entire terminal, weren't letting anyone in and trying to evacuate everyone inside - due to a suspicious package - which I'm guessing was a false alarm because the news failed to cover it.
This happens a lot unfortunately, so much so, that I've sort of gotten used to and shrug it off.
Meanwhile...real estate agent resurfaced after months of no word...her email? "let me know when you want to meet next week, I'm confident we're very close to finding your new home" (Me: Nice to know someone feels confident. Personally? I'd given up. I'm procrastinating responding to her.)
Finished Ghost Story by Jim Butcher on the way home from work. Finally. The plot plodded and wandered. At one point, I wondered if the writer was ever going to get to the blasted point.
What the writer was trying to do isn't easy. And to date? I haven't really seen anyone pull it off.
It's your basic protagonist gets killed and/or is poisoned and/or is framed for murder and spends countless chapters/episodes wandering about helping folks and basically doing everything but resolving the central mystery, which it turns out is resolved through the wandering about helping folks. The resolution, such as it is, is tagged on in the final two-three chapters as a sort of "epithany" - in that the central character much like Dorothy in the Wizard of OZ, had the info he required to solve it all along, and this was just about him getting back to whoever he was. We, the reader and/or viewer are as a result, privy to a lot of navel gazing, quite a bit of introspective flash-backs, and retreads over old territory. In short - the writer expends a lot of words and energy explaining his character and his character's current state to the reader. There's a heck of a lot of telling and not much showing going on. At one point, I wanted to tell Butcher, we get it! Enough already with the pop culture analogies to Star Wars and Star Trek.
I skimmed a lot in this one, which I don't tend to do that much in Butcher's novels or novels in general. There was a lot of pointless actions scenes, with Harry groaning on the sidelines. And
a lot of characters...it felt very crowded and sluggish. Also the writer kept explaining what ghosts were. I think I got the same explanation about five different ways, sometimes they were contradictory, which was a)boring and b) confusing. The writer was clearly struggling with metaphysics - always a dicey topic to do in fiction, without quite falling into religious mythos.
He neatly skirted the whole God question, but not without falling into some time-honored cliche's along the way. Like I said - Christian Mythology or Metaphysics is dicey to do in noir supernatural fiction. I know he was struggling with it - because he spent a lot of time explaining himself. We got lots of long metaphysical discussions about what comes next that went well nowhere.
Or what Harry actually is - which also went nowhere. In short, the writer was circling around the topic he wanted to address. Instead of just addressing it head on. Playing coy.
What did work? The relationship stuff - which more or less always does. Butcher side-stepped the Murphy/Dresden link-up by killing off Dresden. Or having Dresden become the Winter Knight.
There is a potential love triangle developing here between Murphy/Dresden and Molly. Molly clearly is in love with Dresden and feels a great deal of guilt over her role in his shooting.
The resolution to the murder mystery - also sort of works - I even vaguely remember Dresden calling Kincaid in Changes. And asking Molly to erase his memory of it. So that definitely works.
The Mab/Demonreach =Leasandithe/Eternal Silence bit also works quite well and is fascinating.
What does not work is basically everything to do with Uriel and the Angels, and the plot. The whole Corpsestalker/Morty plot arc is entertaining in of itself - but it drags. The Fitz plot arc was grating...and pretty much there to remind us and Harry of where he came from and that he's not a fly-off-the-rack insane wizard, but a guy who tries to help others no matter what. (Sort of knew that already, I didn't need to be reminded.) And it felt a bit on the cliche side - the Sixth Sense meets Oliver. Also - the whole, Harry was lied to by MAB and the fallen Angel about the fact that it was all his fault, and how this removed his ability to choose - seemed a bit over-worked.
It didn't quite play. And I think the writer knew it - because he kept trying to sell it to me.
I mean come on - we can choose who we believe and trust. Believing a lie is also a choice.
But even if it does work, and it very well might for a lot of readers, the writer spent far too much time explaining it. There is far too much exposition in this book. We are told what ghosts are - we get long encyclopedic dissertations on ghosts for example.
The main plot keeps getting explained. Who the Fomor are. Who the Corspestaker is. What ghosts are.
Who Fitz is. I did a lot of skimming, because the writer got repetitive. As a result the good stuff, got a bit lost in the shuffle.
And there is good stuff tucked in there - a really interesting interaction between Harry and his godmother, as well as one between Harry, Eternal Silence, and Ghost Girl Statue (which I'm guessing represented Demonreach and MAB by proxy, just as Eternal Silence and Leandsitdhe did.)
The final scene between Harry, Demonreach and Mab is also quite good. As are the bits with Harry and Molly - who have become equals, whether Harry can see it or not. Murphy is barely there and feels like a thin sketch - so much so, that I wanted to re-read the Murphy novella in Side Jobs.
There's a brief bit on Thomas - which I wanted more of. And a fairly rewarding bit with Bob - actually the Bob discussion is another highlight - Bob gives Harry a lot of clues to his current state.
But 85% of the novel we spend with comical characters that I don't really care that much about and find sort of dull and grating - the nerdy characters, Butters, Morty, Forthill, and Fitz. Morty was at least amusing. But...it's a time-worn trope - go to nerdy, crazy medium that no one trusts or believes and have them be your connection to the one's you love? OR have nerdy forensic/doctor guy be the one who believes you? It's cliche and annoying. I didn't like it in Ghost, I don't like it here. IT's an easy way for the writer to bring a ghost back.
Instead of getting to the point, Butcher circled around to it. I knew at the end of Changes that MAB probably took Harry's body and was working on bringing him back to life. Hello - he tumbled into the cold water, which was where he meet her in his world the first round - she walked off into the cold lake and disappeared into the Never Never. If he'd wanted to avoid MAB, getting shot on a boat probably wasn't the best way to do it. I'd admittedly forgotten about Demonreach - so that surprised me a little as well as confused - why the hell does Demonreach care about Dresden?
Sure he helped Demonreach defend itself against the Skinwalker and took custodianship of it in that fight - but still? That made no sense to me. Wish Butcher spent a bit more time explaining that relationship over the stupid ghost stuff. For a while, in this book, Butcher managed to almost convince me that I may have been wrong about Mab grabbing Harry's - kept hoping I was right. There's a lot of red-herrings or misleads in this book - because you basically have a character who is avoiding the truth.
I'm trying to come up with the words to explain why this book bugged me - it is...well, similar to How I Met Your Mother - the Dad sits his kids down and says, I'm going to tell you how I meet your mother today, it's a really funny story, and he goes off on this wild tangent ....and Mom is no where to be seen. Until the kids begin to wonder what this story is about exactly. Then finally, finally...after a lot of teasing, he tells them. It's like that. When it happens to me with my mother, which it does all the frigging time, I'll often interrupt at some point and say, yes, yes, I get it - can you get to the point please? Because I sort of have to go to the bathroom now and we've been talking for two hours.
That's how I felt reading this book. I wanted to interrupt Butcher and say, yes, yes, I know Harry's not really a bad guy and he'll save the day, yada, yada, yada, can you tell if he's alive or dead, with Mab or not, and who killed him already - because BORED NOW! And seriously the Corpsetaker is not my favorite villain. Although I totally get the metaphor. Power. It's all about power. And Corpsetaker is sort of the ghost version of MAB. For a bit, I was worrying that Corspetaker had Harry's body and was planning on possessing it. Was quite relieved when that didn't happen. Much prefer MAB. MAB is an interesting villain. The sort you love to hate. She has angles. And is quite gray.
Best line? Harry in the post closet nerd universe it is cool to like both Star Wars and Star Trek.
Overall rating? B. Not Butcher's best. But hey it had an intriguing ending, even if it was yet another cliff-hanger. Note to crazy writers - don't leave cliff-hangers at the end of novels, if you won't have another one out for 12 months..Although, I shouldn't complain, George RR Martin makes his readers wait seven years.
This happens a lot unfortunately, so much so, that I've sort of gotten used to and shrug it off.
Meanwhile...real estate agent resurfaced after months of no word...her email? "let me know when you want to meet next week, I'm confident we're very close to finding your new home" (Me: Nice to know someone feels confident. Personally? I'd given up. I'm procrastinating responding to her.)
Finished Ghost Story by Jim Butcher on the way home from work. Finally. The plot plodded and wandered. At one point, I wondered if the writer was ever going to get to the blasted point.
What the writer was trying to do isn't easy. And to date? I haven't really seen anyone pull it off.
It's your basic protagonist gets killed and/or is poisoned and/or is framed for murder and spends countless chapters/episodes wandering about helping folks and basically doing everything but resolving the central mystery, which it turns out is resolved through the wandering about helping folks. The resolution, such as it is, is tagged on in the final two-three chapters as a sort of "epithany" - in that the central character much like Dorothy in the Wizard of OZ, had the info he required to solve it all along, and this was just about him getting back to whoever he was. We, the reader and/or viewer are as a result, privy to a lot of navel gazing, quite a bit of introspective flash-backs, and retreads over old territory. In short - the writer expends a lot of words and energy explaining his character and his character's current state to the reader. There's a heck of a lot of telling and not much showing going on. At one point, I wanted to tell Butcher, we get it! Enough already with the pop culture analogies to Star Wars and Star Trek.
I skimmed a lot in this one, which I don't tend to do that much in Butcher's novels or novels in general. There was a lot of pointless actions scenes, with Harry groaning on the sidelines. And
a lot of characters...it felt very crowded and sluggish. Also the writer kept explaining what ghosts were. I think I got the same explanation about five different ways, sometimes they were contradictory, which was a)boring and b) confusing. The writer was clearly struggling with metaphysics - always a dicey topic to do in fiction, without quite falling into religious mythos.
He neatly skirted the whole God question, but not without falling into some time-honored cliche's along the way. Like I said - Christian Mythology or Metaphysics is dicey to do in noir supernatural fiction. I know he was struggling with it - because he spent a lot of time explaining himself. We got lots of long metaphysical discussions about what comes next that went well nowhere.
Or what Harry actually is - which also went nowhere. In short, the writer was circling around the topic he wanted to address. Instead of just addressing it head on. Playing coy.
What did work? The relationship stuff - which more or less always does. Butcher side-stepped the Murphy/Dresden link-up by killing off Dresden. Or having Dresden become the Winter Knight.
There is a potential love triangle developing here between Murphy/Dresden and Molly. Molly clearly is in love with Dresden and feels a great deal of guilt over her role in his shooting.
The resolution to the murder mystery - also sort of works - I even vaguely remember Dresden calling Kincaid in Changes. And asking Molly to erase his memory of it. So that definitely works.
The Mab/Demonreach =Leasandithe/Eternal Silence bit also works quite well and is fascinating.
What does not work is basically everything to do with Uriel and the Angels, and the plot. The whole Corpsestalker/Morty plot arc is entertaining in of itself - but it drags. The Fitz plot arc was grating...and pretty much there to remind us and Harry of where he came from and that he's not a fly-off-the-rack insane wizard, but a guy who tries to help others no matter what. (Sort of knew that already, I didn't need to be reminded.) And it felt a bit on the cliche side - the Sixth Sense meets Oliver. Also - the whole, Harry was lied to by MAB and the fallen Angel about the fact that it was all his fault, and how this removed his ability to choose - seemed a bit over-worked.
It didn't quite play. And I think the writer knew it - because he kept trying to sell it to me.
I mean come on - we can choose who we believe and trust. Believing a lie is also a choice.
But even if it does work, and it very well might for a lot of readers, the writer spent far too much time explaining it. There is far too much exposition in this book. We are told what ghosts are - we get long encyclopedic dissertations on ghosts for example.
The main plot keeps getting explained. Who the Fomor are. Who the Corspestaker is. What ghosts are.
Who Fitz is. I did a lot of skimming, because the writer got repetitive. As a result the good stuff, got a bit lost in the shuffle.
And there is good stuff tucked in there - a really interesting interaction between Harry and his godmother, as well as one between Harry, Eternal Silence, and Ghost Girl Statue (which I'm guessing represented Demonreach and MAB by proxy, just as Eternal Silence and Leandsitdhe did.)
The final scene between Harry, Demonreach and Mab is also quite good. As are the bits with Harry and Molly - who have become equals, whether Harry can see it or not. Murphy is barely there and feels like a thin sketch - so much so, that I wanted to re-read the Murphy novella in Side Jobs.
There's a brief bit on Thomas - which I wanted more of. And a fairly rewarding bit with Bob - actually the Bob discussion is another highlight - Bob gives Harry a lot of clues to his current state.
But 85% of the novel we spend with comical characters that I don't really care that much about and find sort of dull and grating - the nerdy characters, Butters, Morty, Forthill, and Fitz. Morty was at least amusing. But...it's a time-worn trope - go to nerdy, crazy medium that no one trusts or believes and have them be your connection to the one's you love? OR have nerdy forensic/doctor guy be the one who believes you? It's cliche and annoying. I didn't like it in Ghost, I don't like it here. IT's an easy way for the writer to bring a ghost back.
Instead of getting to the point, Butcher circled around to it. I knew at the end of Changes that MAB probably took Harry's body and was working on bringing him back to life. Hello - he tumbled into the cold water, which was where he meet her in his world the first round - she walked off into the cold lake and disappeared into the Never Never. If he'd wanted to avoid MAB, getting shot on a boat probably wasn't the best way to do it. I'd admittedly forgotten about Demonreach - so that surprised me a little as well as confused - why the hell does Demonreach care about Dresden?
Sure he helped Demonreach defend itself against the Skinwalker and took custodianship of it in that fight - but still? That made no sense to me. Wish Butcher spent a bit more time explaining that relationship over the stupid ghost stuff. For a while, in this book, Butcher managed to almost convince me that I may have been wrong about Mab grabbing Harry's - kept hoping I was right. There's a lot of red-herrings or misleads in this book - because you basically have a character who is avoiding the truth.
I'm trying to come up with the words to explain why this book bugged me - it is...well, similar to How I Met Your Mother - the Dad sits his kids down and says, I'm going to tell you how I meet your mother today, it's a really funny story, and he goes off on this wild tangent ....and Mom is no where to be seen. Until the kids begin to wonder what this story is about exactly. Then finally, finally...after a lot of teasing, he tells them. It's like that. When it happens to me with my mother, which it does all the frigging time, I'll often interrupt at some point and say, yes, yes, I get it - can you get to the point please? Because I sort of have to go to the bathroom now and we've been talking for two hours.
That's how I felt reading this book. I wanted to interrupt Butcher and say, yes, yes, I know Harry's not really a bad guy and he'll save the day, yada, yada, yada, can you tell if he's alive or dead, with Mab or not, and who killed him already - because BORED NOW! And seriously the Corpsetaker is not my favorite villain. Although I totally get the metaphor. Power. It's all about power. And Corpsetaker is sort of the ghost version of MAB. For a bit, I was worrying that Corspetaker had Harry's body and was planning on possessing it. Was quite relieved when that didn't happen. Much prefer MAB. MAB is an interesting villain. The sort you love to hate. She has angles. And is quite gray.
Best line? Harry in the post closet nerd universe it is cool to like both Star Wars and Star Trek.
Overall rating? B. Not Butcher's best. But hey it had an intriguing ending, even if it was yet another cliff-hanger. Note to crazy writers - don't leave cliff-hangers at the end of novels, if you won't have another one out for 12 months..Although, I shouldn't complain, George RR Martin makes his readers wait seven years.
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no subject
Date: 2011-08-12 02:11 am (UTC)I agree w/you that the time spent with Molly and Bob were the best (although I also like Butters a lot, obviously a lot more than you do). These are characters I care about and like seeing developed more.
I'm disappointed in the lack of Thomas and the current state of Karen Murphy (how did you put it? "Murphy is barely there and feels like a thin sketch ") - but it has only been 6 months and I think both Thomas & Murphy get a pass on not being able to move on quickly.... I think only the direst need (and guilt) forced Molly to move on and develop so many new skills so quickly.
So I didn't hate the book... but I actually think you are an easy grader giving it a 'B'.... no, maybe a 'B' is about right.
no subject
Date: 2011-08-12 05:07 pm (UTC)Was going to give it a C+, but decided that I didn't dislike it. And there were some really good moments...which made up for the wandering plot.
Also to be fair, the plot did resolve itself in a logical manner, which is more than I can say for a few other writers...
Granted Morty being a force to be reckoned with seemed a bit...of a push, but Butcher has the fact that we are completely in Dresden's pov and only know what Dresden knows..as fair justification for
it being a big surprise. Same with Demonreach - it makes sense that Dresden didn't understand the full implications of his deal with Demonreach (he often doesn't when he jumps into these things.)
Characterwise? The story works. All the characters are in character. They are all pushed more or less to a new place from the previous novel/novella.
The biggest problem was the exposition and plot.
But like I said above? I've seen worse.
no subject
Date: 2011-08-12 05:34 pm (UTC)I seriously loved learning that his life became better in the time since he had helped Harry, like he had gained more self respect and a little higher purpose. It is nice to know about a minor character from a past book who has been growing quietly in the timeline of the series.
I love that Jim Butcher brings back characters (okay, I got really sick of Holier than Thou Michael, but I love it when he brings back most of his characters!) and actually gives them character development (I've read a lot of books where it seems like only the principle characters get to grow).
no subject
Date: 2011-08-12 10:11 pm (UTC)(Didn't bother me all that much, but I'm also not an atheist, as you know. ;-) OTOH - I did think he fell into some cliches with the angel uriel and the whole in between gag, as well as the whole Michael bit. I deleted from my review a paragraph that said his weakest books are the ones that deal with Christian mythology and demons/angels. Death Masks and Grave Intent - are the two weakest books of the series. Well that and the werewolf book which I think I only have on CD - made better with Marsters sexy raspy voice. No one does werewolves well.)
Agree at any rate on Holier than Thou Michael and Charity. Molly - for a bit - I was worried about, now I love her to pieces.
Butcher is at his best when he sticks to noir supernatural.
Oh don't get me wrong - I like Butters and Morty quite a bit - both are a hoot and made me laugh, I just think a little can go a long way. (Sort of like Andrew on Buffy - Over-using certain characters - can make them less interesting. ) Morty worked. Fitz did not - fell into cliche. Butters - was a bit overused, I think, but I get why - Butcher couldn't use Murphy, since she'd shut down due to her grief over Dresden's loss. The woman was in love with him and had never told him or conveyed it. The novella gets that across. Same deal with Thomas - I totally understood that.
No - what drug was the whole confusing Corpsetalker/Aristeades plot lines which had very little to do with the other characters. We spent far too much time with Sir Stuart (who I liked well enough)
and far too little time with Molly, Murphy, and the werewolves (although I admittedly prefer Butters to the weres.)
Actually - it was mostly the plot - too much pointless action - felt like the writer was drawing out the plot, sort of meandering much like I do in my posts actually. A good editor could have cut a lot of that, and gotten him to focus more. (I'm coming to the conclusion that there aren't nearly enough good editors out there. They are all in acquisitions. It's becoming a lost art-form. This book lacked a really good editor. Same problem with Rowling's last two books, and god, don't get me started on the Dark Horse comics. Editing isn't easy - I know I've done it. Hard. Much harder in some respects than writing. )
no subject
Date: 2011-08-12 10:44 pm (UTC)I definitely agree that Jim Butcher didn't have enough plot here so he dragged things out way too much to hide that fact with a lot of unnecessary running around, and repetitious exposition.
And I definitely agree about Fool Moon being one of the weakest books (the different kinds of werewolves were an interesting idea, but not enough to hang an entire novel on)....
What really bugs me is how the Christian stuff gets bogged down in all kinds of magical silliness with the swords and Uriel and Michael's whole thing. I guess it is partly that I'm cool w/Jim Butcher reworking the mythology of vampires and fairies (all the fantasy stuff), but when he starts to fantasize about the Catholic Church it starts seeming kind of creepy 'Dan Brown DaVinci Code' and starts to get on my nerves).
Everyone probably has a different take on all that Christian mythology, but for me it seems creepy (like almost Mel Gibson extremist sect creepy) and I wish he would back off of all that.... But I don't think he will, I think it may actually mean something to him (but I don't know what).
no subject
Date: 2011-08-13 01:45 am (UTC)I felt like he had this great idea but didn't quite know how to execute it. It's like he knew where he wanted his character to end up, but not exactly how to get him there.
What really bugs me is how the Christian stuff gets bogged down in all kinds of magical silliness with the swords and Uriel and Michael's whole thing. I guess it is partly that I'm cool w/Jim Butcher reworking the mythology of vampires and fairies (all the fantasy stuff), but when he starts to fantasize about the Catholic Church it starts seeming kind of creepy 'Dan Brown DaVinci Code' and starts to get on my nerves).
You're not alone. Creepy is right. And it grates on my nerves as well. I admittedly rather liked the fallen angel in Harry's head for a bit, but at the same time - there was something about that whole story thread that well grated.
And I do a lot of eye-rolling whenever Michael, Charity, Father Forthill, and the whole sword bit is brought up. Christian Mythology...is hard to do well, because most writers can't step back from it far enough to be critical of the mythos to objectively explore it. It's too ingrained in their own belief system. Or too emotional. Religion, particularly judeo-christian religion has become a emotional powder-keg. In part, I think, because our politics lately have become so entangled with it. Religion is political hot potato. Heck - on my flist, someone stated that Fox News Facebook page erupted with death threats against atheists from alleged Christians (alleged because no Christian would wish to kill anyone. Death threats are sort of anti-Christian. Just as they are anti-Islam. ) People no longer think rationally when it comes to religion - they just react. It's sort of like Bangle and Spuffy fans going at it on the internet, except, well with death threats. So, worse.
I think Supernatural may be the only series that I've seen handle the Christian mythos in a satirical and critical light within a definitive noir universe. Although Terry Prachett and Neil Gaiman have also attacked the mythos...with wit. Butcher takes the Christian mythos too seriously for his own good. I wish he'd stick to the fairies, vampires, and wizard stuff - which is what he excels at. I like the pagan mythos. The other mythos doesn't quite jibe for me.
no subject
Date: 2011-08-13 02:21 am (UTC)It would be interesting to really pick Jim Butcher's brain to figure out just what he thinks he is doing... I get the impression that he isn't really that religious himself and sees Roman Catholicism as fertile ground that he can use along with Thor.... but I'm not sure. I mean I know that he does keep reminding people that this is really just fiction/fantasy. So who knows?
Anyway I am definitely feeling like you: that he might lose me as a reader if he goes too far down this road. But I do absolutely love stuff like Demonreach and I'm hoping there will be more of him in the next book (I'm also deeply in love with Mouse, whatever kind of being he really is). I really do enjoy these books.
Terry Pratchett and Neil Gaiman really did manage to have a very light touch w/their Christian mythos in 'Good Omens'... but I even prefer Pratchett's 'Small Gods' (which takes place on the Discworld so there is no actual Christianity) and Gaiman's 'American Gods' (which seems to be following Indian and folk Gods and avoiding the major religions). They were both writing more about human's need for belief (kind of what Joss Whedon did in the Firefly episode 'Jayne's Town' where he stuck to hero worship and belief... while dancing away from River trying to 'fix' Book's Bible).
no subject
Date: 2011-08-13 03:37 am (UTC)Because the religious bothered them. And I've admittedly struggled with it. Luckily he doesn't do it in every book.
It would be interesting to really pick Jim Butcher's brain to figure out just what he thinks he is doing... I get the impression that he isn't really that religious himself and sees Roman Catholicism as fertile ground that he can use along with Thor.... but I'm not sure. I mean I know that he does keep reminding people that this is really just fiction/fantasy. So who knows?
Butcher feels a bit like an agnostic ex-Catholic to me, with a lot of religious baggage. Which I understand. Have quite a few of those in my own family.
And...I can't fault him entirely for playing with the mythos. To be fair - Uriel is not painted as a "white knight". And Mouse is a "demon dog" - according to Lea in Changes. Not an angel dog exactly.
Actually it's not quite clear what Mouse is. (I also love Mouse to pieces.)
I've tried to peg Butcher, but can't quite do it. And there is precedent in this particular genre for what he's doing with the Christian mythos - (see Supernatural, Frailty, Lord of the Rings, CS Lewis Chronicles of Narnia...). And it is deeply ingrained in American mythology and culture. We, like it or not, are a Judeo/Christian culture.
Also it fits with Butcher's theme regarding the use and abuses of power - which seems to be the theme of just about everything I've read or seen to date. Seriously, you'd think someone could find something else to talk about? Or maybe I've been reading and seeing too much of the same thing and need to vary my cultural content a bit? (ponders)
That said...I think there is a fine line here - regarding religion.
It's true in blogging as well. Or even family discussions. I ran into it recently - my Aunts carry a lot of negative baggage with them regarding Catholicism, and one proceeded to give me the "Angry Atheist" lecture.
Butcher in some respects comes very close to crossing the line on the other side of the fence - but just barely jumps back across the line - when he has Harry rediscover his faith in himself. Or trust in himself - which is what Harry lost at the end of Changes, he no longer had faith in his own choices or his own ability to be truly himself. He believed Mab or someone else could change him into a monster. Which is actually the central theme of Ghost Story - faith in oneself and one's own choices. That we have choice or free will.
That the world is not black and white, and our choices aren't clear cut.
So...even though the whole guardian angel, Uriel, in Between bit was admittedly a bit difficult to swallow...it was well balanced with the other, so I could let it go.
no subject
Date: 2011-08-13 02:00 pm (UTC)And of course temptation of real serious power is a BIG temptation. I haven't been a big fan of the whole Fairies/NeverNever thing but I'm kind of excited about Harry welding the power of the Winter Knight without letting that power take him over and change him. I think that Demonreach may be an ally for Harry with that (we'll see).
no subject
Date: 2011-08-13 08:07 pm (UTC)That said? I rather like Mab and Leah...who are fairly complex femme fatales - more complex than most of the female villains in his books. And far more interesting than Bianca.
Agree on Lascial - I found that interesting - the idea of being corrupted from within, or the battle of wits.