This is a collection of Harry Dresden short stories, collected into one volume. Usually the stories are part of a science-fiction-fantasy anthology written by many authors, of which a Dresden will be one of many in the book. I used to buy these anthologies for the Dresden story, until I realize if I wait long enough, a compendium of Dresden shorts will be assembled and published, and THAT was what I really wanted.
Though now that I'm using the library more, I could probably borrow the anthologies...
Eh.
I had read many of these short stories before, mostly in the Big Foot collection. There were, however, a few I hadn't read. I enjoyed the Molly tales, especially the one where she earned her svartalf apartment. Molly's thinking voice, however, while a bit too male, and a lot too Dresden, is still quite enjoyable to read.
The book is a must for any Dresden fan, and would make little sense to anyone else.
And pretty sure I missed a bunch of my highlighted quotes, what, reading on a broken kindle and such.
Cold Case
Carlos squinted his eyes and studied the bartender, as if weighing the value of heeding her words versus the personal pleasure he would take in being contrary. Harry Dresden has had a horrible influence on far too many people, and has much to answer for.
Page 288
“Knights of the Cross never have any missions they question?” Carlos asked.
“I think they get a different kind of question,” I said. “For Dad, it was always about saving everyone. Not just the victims. He had to try for the monsters, too.”
“Weird,” Carlos said.
“Not so weird,” I said. “Maybe if someone had offered a hand to the monsters, they wouldn’t have become monsters in the first place. You know?”
Page 305
Yeah, I'm finally in a place where I don't have Internet. This is both fantastic and, well, fantastic. I'm on my way to both reading five books this week, and being completely and totally okay without my computer. An interesting happy place to be.
I can't say that I'm a big Neil Gaiman fan. I know, I know, I've read a number of his books, but the more of his books I read, the less I'm interested in reading his books. I'm not sure why this is, but I'll speculate that a large part of my lack of enthusiasm is due to the small amplitude of the plots in his books. In particular, I find most of his stories that I've read plod along. The climax of the of the stories are often "Oh, okay" instead of "OH MY GOD WOW," or something close to that. There isn't a thrilling zing or fast heartbeats or shallow breathing, just a thing that happened that of course it would happen, because, really, that's what should happen and okay.
Jonathan was reading this book. I don't know why he was reading this book, or where he came by it, but he was reading this book, so I also picked up this book. Included in this collection of short stories is the story, "Stories of Your Life" upon which the movie The Arrival is based. I haven't seen the movie, but Jonathan said he was enjoying the short stories, so I picked up the book.