{"id":13532,"date":"2021-02-15T13:24:44","date_gmt":"2021-02-15T18:24:44","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/orionscoldfire.com\/?p=13532"},"modified":"2021-02-15T13:24:44","modified_gmt":"2021-02-15T18:24:44","slug":"battle-ground-a-novel-of-the-dresden-files-by-jim-butcher-an-sff-book-review","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/orionscoldfire.com\/index.php\/2021\/02\/15\/battle-ground-a-novel-of-the-dresden-files-by-jim-butcher-an-sff-book-review\/","title":{"rendered":"Battle Ground \u2013 A Novel of The Dresden Files \u2013 by Jim Butcher \u2013 An SF&F Book Review"},"content":{"rendered":"

Spoiler Alert.\u00a0 All my reviews are spoilers.\u00a0 If you wan to avoid them go down to the end and just read my recommendation.<\/u><\/em><\/p>\n

For anyone coming to this review without any background to the Dresden Files, Battle Ground is I believe the seventeenth book of that series.\u00a0 Jim Butcher has created quite a complicated and very entertaining world that centers on a Chicago that is embedded in a reality that has several kinds of vampires, two faery realms, werewolves, sasquatches, Norse mythological characters, Knights of the Cross, Fallen Angels and wizards.\u00a0 And in particular Harry Dresden is the extremely conflicted and always wise-cracking Wizard of Chicago.\u00a0 If you want to delve into the series, I guess it would be much more sensible and fun to start at book one but to each his own.<\/p>\n

Battle Ground is the conclusion of the story arc begun in the previous book, Peace Talks.\u00a0 And for all intents and purposes this book is taken up by the Battle of Chicago.\u00a0 A really angry Titan named Ethniu has decided to destroy Chicago as a way to turn the human world against the supernatural groups that were parties to the \u201cUnseelie Accords\u201d that acted as a council to ensure that humans do not discover the hidden creatures all around them.<\/p>\n

Along with her amphibious allies the Fomor who have a settlement under Lake Michigan they attack the city and with the power of the \u201cEye,\u201d that Ethniu wields, they begin destroying the city and killing the population.\u00a0 Standing against this systematic destruction and murder of Chicago is Harry and his allies.\u00a0 I won\u2019t say friends because many of them fear and\/or hate him.\u00a0 He has an Italian American mobster turned supernatural power broker named Marcone providing significant infrastructure, manpower and significant strategic support.\u00a0 He has his current boss the Queen of Air and Darkness, Mab the Winter Queen, providing her troops and her own very considerable magical powers.\u00a0 There are Harry\u2019s nominal brothers in arms, the White Council of Wizards that are always right at the edge of expelling him for all the unorthodox and insubordinate actions he takes.\u00a0 This includes his grandfather Ebenezar McCoy who is more or less the head of the Council and who always seem on the edge of either throttling Harry or apologizing to him.\u00a0 There are the Knights of the Cross who are Harry\u2019s friends and possess power that can stand against the evil that the enemy represent but even with these allies Harry and his friends are hopelessly overmatched.<\/p>\n

But Harry has one ace in the hole.\u00a0 He has a magical resource that if he can lure the Titan to a certain spot would allow him to capture her permanently.\u00a0 But in order to do that Ethniu would have to be lured in by targets that she wanted to destroy and the destruction that she would accomplish would be ruinous.\u00a0 And that is what the book is about.\u00a0 As Harry and his allies go block by block saving civilians and battling monsters the Titan levels the city skyscrapers on her way to confronting Mab and the other powerful leaders.\u00a0 And it\u2019s a long book, over four hundred pages and the overwhelming majority of the book is this battle.<\/p>\n

If you\u2019re a fan of the series, and obviously if you\u2019re still reading at book seventeen then you are, you will like this book a lot.\u00a0 Sure, there are parts of the battle that seem kind of repetitive or at least maybe overkill.\u00a0 And I have never been a big fan of Harry\u2019s romantic attachment to Karren Murphy.\u00a0 For whatever reason it never seems to keep my interest.\u00a0 And there are a few scenes where some of the characters sound a little too touchy feely with too much \u201cI\u2019m here for you,\u201d and all that.\u00a0 But there is plenty on the battle side and on the personal side of this story to satisfy fans of the books.\u00a0 Some questions from Peace Talks get answered and some things that were left hanging remain that way.\u00a0 Some old friends and enemies die.\u00a0 Others change their relation to Harry and further complicate his life.\u00a0 And some characters that do not have a major part in the action still provide a needed presence.\u00a0 I always enjoy the character of Michael Carpenter.\u00a0 He\u2019s the retired Knight of the Cross who is probably the most grounded character in the series and also provides sanctuary for Harry\u2019s young daughter when horrible things come looking for Harry.\u00a0 And Harry reaches a kind of crossroads with respect to his stature in the supernatural world.\u00a0 He is now a heavy hitter and has gained respect and even some wisdom.<\/p>\n

What can I say?\u00a0 You\u2019re going to like most of this book. And there will be few things that you won\u2019t care for.\u00a0 But if you\u2019re a Dresden fan you will have to read it.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Spoiler Alert.\u00a0 All my reviews are spoilers.\u00a0 If you wan to avoid them go down to the end and just read my recommendation. For anyone<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_mi_skip_tracking":false,"_exactmetrics_sitenote_active":false,"_exactmetrics_sitenote_note":"","_exactmetrics_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[241,237,4,242],"tags":[68,200,1485,10,38,1355,1486,59],"class_list":["post-13532","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-book-reviews","category-reviews","category-sff","category-sff-book-reviews","tag-book-review","tag-fantasy","tag-harry-dresden","tag-jim-butcher","tag-review","tag-reviews","tag-the-dresden-files","tag-urban-fantasy"],"yoast_head":"\nBattle Ground \u2013 A Novel of The Dresden Files \u2013 by Jim Butcher \u2013 An SF&F Book Review - Orion's Cold Fire<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/orionscoldfire.com\/index.php\/2021\/02\/15\/battle-ground-a-novel-of-the-dresden-files-by-jim-butcher-an-sff-book-review\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Battle Ground \u2013 A Novel of The Dresden Files \u2013 by Jim Butcher \u2013 An SF&F Book Review - Orion's Cold Fire\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"Spoiler Alert.\u00a0 All my reviews are spoilers.\u00a0 If you wan to avoid them go down to the end and just read my recommendation. 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