This is a police procedural with a difference, as there is a department which deals with magic and magical beings and at least some of the more senior policemen in other forces are aware of it. Magical beings foregrounded in the book are the spirits of rivers, one of whom is the girlfriend of the main character, Peter. Peter himself is a lowly constable, but he works in the magical department and is a wizard in training.

I liked some aspects of this book, which I realised was set some way into a series. There are a lot of mentions of a character called Lesley who apparently betrayed the organisation for which Peter works. At various times, she contacts him and he eventually obtains a disposable mobile phone on which he can return her texts and actually phone her, as another policeman, who is trying to arrest her, wants Peter to try to entrap her if possible.

There are some things which don't seem to go anywhere in this book, such as a couple of characters who live in a strange house and are very involved with bees. And there are some creatures which could be the Sidhe, but a rather nastier lot than the traditional ones, at least from a physical point of view.

Peter is out in the countryside, away from his comfort zone in London, initially to interview the bee people but then staying on to help out in a search for two missing schoolgirls. The police procedural side is well done, with much officialise and jargon, and various references to modern police practices. Where I felt the book didn't do so well was with the portrayal of murderous unicorns, which I somehow could not take seriously, especially as Peter jokingly makes My Little Pony references about them, and the whole wrapup to the book which came across as a bit of an anticlimax leaving far too much unresolved. So on balance I would rate this at 3 stars and probably won't bother with any more of the series. ( )

Neben "Die Glocke von Whitechapel" definitiv mein liebstes Buch in der Serie. Ich weiß nicht, ob wegen der ländlichen Gegend (als jemand der Metropolen als definitiv überfordernd empfindet und für Wälder und Felder einfach immer mehr Platz in seinem Herz hat) oder einfach insgesamt wegen der Charakter und der gesamten Stimmung des Buches.

Trotz des spannenden Falles und der faszinierenden Erweiterung unserer Horizonte was die Magie Englands anbelangt, kann man das Buch wohl gut mit dem Ausdruck "No plot, just vibes" zusammen fassen. Etwas falsch, angesichts der Tatsache, dass wir hier immer noch einen Fall zu lösen und die insgesamt Bedrohung des gesichtslosen Magiers haben, aber trotzdem finde ich, dass das Buch vor Allem mit seiner Stimmung punktet.

Kudos außerdem für die wachsende Beziehung zwischen Bev und Peter, ich mag die beiden wirklich gerne zusammen. ( )

Book five in the detective/urban fantasy series Rivers of London. Although this one is less urban and more rural, as our protagonist, police officer and wizard-in-training Peter Grant, is sent out to a small village in the countryside to assist in a case involving two missing eleven-year-old girls, which probably doesn't actually have any supernatural component. Probably.

My responses to these novels seem to be pretty consistent, really. They're interesting enough for me to keep going with the series, but I never seem to find them anywhere near as engaging as I feel like I should. I mean, I like Ben Aaronovitch, who wrote one of my all-time favorite classic Doctor Who episodes, as well as the possibly even better novel version of it. I like the main character. I like the world-building, overall. I like the pleasantly geeky sensibility, and the clueful handling of class and race and other issues. The plots are decent enough, and the way that this one starts out as almost pure police procedural and then evolves into something with deep roots magical folklore is at least theoretically interesting. It seems like it should all add up to something I really, really enjoy! And yet, in the end I just feel like I've just read something deeply, deeply... okay.

I'm starting to think, actually, that the issue may in fact be that it's the police procedural half of the crossed genres here that I'm not quite vibing with. I haven't actually read many of the more mundane kind, and maybe they're just not quite my kind of thing, I don't know. ( )

I really enjoy these books. They make me read like I did when I was a kid. I stay up too late at night, read at the dinner table, avoid/ignore conversations with humans to get in more reading time, and generally just race through them like a kid running with scissors.

Their just so much fun. But now, I've whizzed through this one and will have to wait probably a year for the next. Sadness is quickly settling in. ;) ( )

Peter Grant ends up in the small village of Herefordshire where the local police are reluctant to admit that there might be a supernatural element to the disappearance of some local children. But while you can take the London copper out of London, you can’t take the London out of the copper. Grant soon finds himself caught up in a deep mystery and having to tackle local cops and local gods in a town where all the shops are closed by 4pm. I’ve really been enjoying what a rollicking ride this series is, especially listening to it on audiobook. I can always count on having my day stolen entirely while I steal every possible side moment to listen. I also have to admit that when he was reading off directions on where he was going in the beginning of the book, I was hopping up and down and screeching that I’D BEEN THERE, I’D BEEN THERE! ( )