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Small Favor
Jim Butcher

I wasn't going to read this book yet. I was going to patiently wait for it to come out in paperback the same way I'm waiting for several other books to come out in paperback. But I have a husband. And one of the nice things about my husband is that he is often impulsive on my behalf. So he used his Easter money to buy the absolute newest hot off the presses book in the Dresden Files. Now of course it will be at least another year before there is a new one, but we're all up to date.

I honestly can't wait till this series ends. Once it does I'll have great joy in rereading all of the books and finally figuring out who the heck is on whose side and why. Very complicated books. A lot of the motivations are deliberately obscure (especially for all of those pesky fairies). At this point I've resigned myself to the fact that since Harry doesn't know everything yet, we shouldn't either.

One of the things I particularly like about these books is their peculiar ability to balance so precariously between worlds. Not just between the fantastic and the mundane either, but between the spiritual as well. I asked Nick the other day about what Jim Butcher (the author) must think about God. His main character Harry Dresden describes himself as someone who doesn't sit down to chat with God, and Harry figures God prefers it that way. But Harry's best friend Michael is a shining example of what a Christian should be. As Harry tells God in a bit of a rant, "Michael makes you look really good. So you had better live up to it." Just makes me wonder about the author himself. Is he like Harry with a friend like Michael?

Anyway, aside from being even more complicated than usual, this is your standard Dresden book. A rollicking ride with equal parts humor and tragedy. And a really sarcastic main character. You can't go wrong with one of those.