Storm Front: A Fun, For TV/Movie Novel

I have a confession: as a reader, I’ve begun to dislike long book series. Part of this attitude was spurred after reading the first two books in the KingKiller Chronicle series, where readers have been waiting for the past 15 years for the conclusion. So, when I was handed Storm Front as a secret santa gift at my workplace, I was a bit skeptical. I didn’t want to have to read four books on top of this one to get a complete story.

To my pleasant surprise, however, the novel not only stands alone, but was also quite fun to read. The story follows Harry Dresden, a cynical arcane private eye, as he tries to solve a paranormal mystery.

I found the author did a great job at setting the tone and sticking to it. It is written with a lot of love for the mystery/noire/detective genre, and Dresden is a (mostly) compelling character who I liked. I also (mostly) enjoyed the supporting cast; the dialogue was fun, characters were distinct and memorable, and I wanted to know more about them when the story was over.

The magic system was also interesting, although the book does fall into the trap of using vague terms/rules to hopefully sell you on the series. Despite the cryptic way that magic works (conveniently for Dresden a lot of the time), I found that I really enjoyed the system and did want to learn more about it. I should look to see if Jim Butcher sells a “Dresden Files Magic Guide”…

Despite the good, there were a number of things I didn’t enjoy while reading this. Dresden calls himself “old-fashioned” in his view of the world, in particular with his treatment of women. I actually didn’t mind most of his actions towards the female cast in this book (of which almost all were important to the plot), but I didn’t like the author’s way of writing them. Even if the female cast were important to move the plot along, they didn’t actually do all that much other than act as damsels which Dresden had to save. Our hero even betrays the trust of one of these women (who was supposedly his friend), and while I appreciate that there were a number of consequences for this both during the story and the epilogue, it still felt a bit wrong.

Aside from characters, the pacing of the story I felt was too slow, then all at once. Normally this is what you expect: slow buildup, then a brilliant climax. However, the story only has so many characters, and before halfway through I figured out who the murderer was and was impatiently waiting for the ending. Not to say that this is a bad story, but it would have helped if the mystery was a little more mysterious.

Overall, I quite enjoyed this short read. I think the story knew what it wanted to be and stuck to it. I’d recommend this to fantasy readers who are a little sick of tomes of knowledge and don’t mind suspending some disbelief for a fun ride.

Verdict: 3/5