A few years back I read Stormfront, the first book in Jim Butcher’s The Dresden Files. Although I liked the story, I didn’t like the main character harry Dresden, nor did I like the number one supporting character Detective Karrin Murphy. I thought Harry Dresden was a class-A jerk, and Murphy was a thug with a gun and a badge. I just did not like either one of these characters. Friends of mine who had read more of the books assured me that they get better.
Fast forward to today, and I have read the second book in the series, Fool Moon. Dresden is a more likeable character. Murphy, on the other hand, is still a thug with a gun and a badge. Murphy also jumps to conclusions based purely on circumstantial evidence. Some friend!
Johnny Marcone returns, and he is a convincing character that works well. He is a real thug, Chicago’s gangland master. He also has some legitimate business interests.
As for Fool Moon, this is another good tale from Jim Butcher. As the title suggests, we’re going to get werewolves. Lots of them. Butcher obviously did his homework on werewolf folklore and had me doing some of my own. I had no idea that folklore presented so many different ways of achieving the lycanthropic effect, as I am so used to what we used to get in the movies. Full Moon rises, and, behold, Lon Chaney, Jr., becomes the Wolfman. Nope, in Fool Moon, we get a lot more, and Butcher gives each type a unique moniker fitting the type.
Dresden finds himself drawn into an investigation of a recent outbreak of murders that look like wolf attacks, but forensic evidence points to something not quite wolf-like. Thus his research into werewolves with the help of Bob, his air spirit in a skull.
Not wanting to give out too much in the way of spoilers, everything about Dresden’s investigation goes wrong at every turn, and somehow still manages to pull his bacon out of the frying pan in the nick of time. This makes for a nice, fast paced story with plenty of action. It is also extremely violent, more so than what I recall from Stormfront. But then we are dealing with werewolves.
Susan Rodriguez is an important character in this story, not only as the reporter for the Arcane, but also bails Dresden out of several tight situations, and we see a budding romance as it becomes obvious that she has deep feelings for Dresden. Susan is a likeable character, and, character-wise, I think she helps bring out some of the better qualities in Dresden that we see in this book.
Meanwhile, Butcher stitches together some very nice prose, especially when describing the full moon coming up at the climax of the book where Butcher gives us some really nice imagery that goes beyond your typical “silvery moon”. Overall I enjoyed reading Fool Moon more than Stormfront, in part because it was a darn good tale, and also due to Dresden’s improving character. And if you are wondering if I will read more in the series, the answer is, you betcha. Albeit it may be awhile as I have several other books staged up ahead of the next book in the series.
