Winter's Gifts

This Rivers of London spinoff features American FBI agent Kimberly Reynolds. Though not a practitioner herself, her job involves dealing with the unexplained. In this novella, she's off to northern Wisconsin because a retired agent has called in a report of some seriously weird stuff. When she gets there, she finds that he was not lying. And also, he's now a missing person.

As far as the story goes, it's fine. There's a not-entirely-convincing romance subplot, and the whole of the main plot felt a little over-complicated, but probably not more so than the main series. My main problem was that I listened to the audiobook. While the British narrator did a mostly convincing American accent, she did tack an "r" sound on the end of words show more ending in vowels, rendering "parka" as "parker," and boy were there a lot of mentions of parkas in this book. Did it take me out of the story every time? You betcha. I feel like this book suffered from a man writing from a woman's perspective, and from a Brit writing from an American perspective, but not so much that I didn't enjoy the reading experience. Recommended for series completists. show less

Somebody should have really told Ben Aaronovitch not to name a Wisconsin character "Scott Walker"... That said, this was an enjoyable story, nice to get another new perspective in this world. I find the novellas to be not as tightly written and edited as the mainline novels, and this one is no exception. Would still recommend it to fans of the series!

Well. I did not like this one. I did not like it so much that I wrote and rewrote rants throughout the reading of it. I'm tempted just to post it all but I'll edit down to one from the middle. So:
I would dearly love to write a winky complaining review about the attempts to write a woman and an american, or the little mistakes about Wisconsin, or mostly about the one glaring terrible mistake about naming a Wisconsin character after one of our biggest villains without anyone even mentioning it, but I can't, because this whole story is just yet another white dude appropriating native culture for his own entertainment and profit. Can we stop? Please? If you want to mine your own history for folklore to turn into modern magic, that's great. show more But don't steal from oppressed indigenous people who rarely if ever get to tell their own stories. It's not "respectful" no matter how you feel you're writing it. show less

It is no secret that I am a huge fan of the Peter Grant series and consider the audio versions some of the best books I've ever enjoyed. Winter's Gifts is the latest novella entry into the series and centers on an ancillary character, American FBI Agent Kimberly Reynolds ("oooooh"), first introduced in [b:Whispers Under Ground|10814687|Whispers Under Ground (Rivers of London, #3)|Ben Aaronovitch|https://i.gr-assets.com/images/S/compressed.photo.goodreads.com/books/1349807829l/10814687._SY75_.jpg|14864236]. Set primarily in my home state of Wisconsin, it was an interesting look at culture and local myths through outsider perspective that mostly succeeded.

A retired special investigator calls the FBI tipline and eventually Reynolds is part show more of the investigation. She heads off into the 'Nort'Woods,' as we say, with the rest of her crew intending to join her later--until a wicked snowstorm hits and changes plans. We all know, of course, that there is nothing natural about this storm, but Kimberly is a little slow on the uptake. Eventually, the plot takes off and there is a nice balance of tension and action, although it is occasionally sidelined by Kimberly's libido. Per Kimberly, this is unusual for her, so maybe Aaronovitch is trying to work in a future resource for Peter to draw upon (part of his "enhanced partnership with local resources" philosophy). I had a mixed reaction to it myself, a combination of irritation and amusement. I settled on 'amusement,' but it could have gone the other way depending on reader and mood. Do we really need to pair everyone off? Must females be paired off? And for heaven's sake, why do men who don't normally write in female narrative think they can attempt a woman thinking about attraction and sex?

I liked the plotting which starts simply and quickly becomes more layered as Kimberly discovers the former FBI agent has gone missing. I appreciated the level of both sensitivity and complexity to the plotting, but thought it became quite tangled at a couple of points. This is one that probably could have been drawn out to novel length, although not to Peter-level description of architecture and the like (we are, however, treated to depictions of the Nort'woods denizens' trucks that are 100% accurate).

For me, the major detraction was the attempt to integrate Kimberly's religious upbringing and current religious perspective that just did not ring true. I'm not sure I felt the truth, so to speak, of the fundamentalist upbringing and the magic-aware adult and how she balanced the two in her head. He even opened the book in her voice with some down-home Jesus-speech--shudder. Thankfully, it didn't last. What is missing, however, is that complex layering of humor, compassion, and sarcasm that Peter brings to his story-telling. I think there were humorous moments, but they were fewer and farther between.

Despite my deep affection for the series, non-Peter entries do not fare as well for me. I find it difficult to parse out whether it is Peter-bias, but honestly, I think it comes down to Peter being the perfect voice for Aaronovitch's style. However, it was a lot of fun to see a more American-style investigation in action, along with a different kind of mythology. I'm definitely not mad that I got a hardcover signed edition for my library, but I know better than to try to listen to anyone but Kobna read the book. show less

I’m always happy to see what’s new in the Rivers of London-verse, even if Nightingale isn’t there to investigate. (I know even wizards like him can’t live forever, but I love him to pieces and don’t want him to ever leave.) Nice to acknowledge the Indigenous people who were in North America first; I just hope an Ojibwe person was able to provide advice on those bits of the book.

I do think calling this a novella is pushing it if it’s over 200 pages. Maybe these days 200 pages is a novella because people regularly crank out 800+-page doorstoppers.

2020s, urban-fantasy, FBI, verbal-humor, situational-humor, Northern-Wisconsin, myths-legends, mysteries, novella, magic, missing-persons, supernatural, paranormal, meteorologist, series, snow-season, blizzards, tornado, Lake-Superior, Ojibwe, spoof*****

FBI Special Agent Kimberley Reynolds gets tagged to go to the frozen North of Wisconsin in response to a call from a retired FBI agent who signals that magic is involved. When she gets there things are even loonier and the man has disappeared. Good thing that she has spent time in England with Peter Grant and has a fair handle on EuroAmerican spooks and magic. While in Wisconsin she gets to learn a bit about Ojibwe magic and tales, including a nineteenth century expedition that seemed to show more vanish and also a snow monster. Great story with only a few glitches because of the thing about England/America being separated by a common language. Excellent fun!
Good thing I'm overdue on this review, because the first ever tornadoes ever recorded in Wisconsin in the usually frigid month of February caused more than $2.4 million in damage on February 8, 2024.
I requested and received a temporary EARC from Subterranean Press via NetGalley, misplaced it and paid for an audio copy. Don't waste your money on the audio because the narrator will make you nuts with her pronunciations of liberry (library) and parkerrr (parka as in jacket). But the story is 10/10. show less

A fun read showcasing Agent Reynolds on her patch.

However, I found the novella format unsatisfying; it works with stories set in England because there is enough background on The Folly in other stories to fill in the background. Here, there is not enough background to make up for gaps - although it helps being an X-Files fan. We just don't know enough about the interaction between The Folly and colonial America; all we see are some tantalising hints of the various traditions - both First Nations and colonial, with hints of voudoun.

I felt the story could have done with being longer with more exposition. However, that could be problematic, falling foul of sensitivity readers, but may have created a better story, in that we could see the show more melting pot of different European traditions meeting Newtonian magic and First Nations magics.

Recommended. show less