The Dresden Readthrough: Skin Game

We conclude our readthrough of Jim Butcher's uber-popular urban fantasy series The Dresden Files today with book fifteen, Skin Game. We made it, guys! We did it! High five!

So we've reached the latest volume of the series, and I have to say that, after seeing how it was going in the last volume, I thought this was quite the step backwards.

The Dresden Readthrough: Cold Days

We continue our readthrough of Jim Butcher's uber-popular urban fantasy series The Dresden Files today with book fourteen, Cold Days. The continuing plan has been to do a book a month on the first Tuesday of each month, and with the final released book scheduled for us for next month, we're at least set through the end of 2014.

As for Cold Days, it may have already supplanted the previous book as my new favorite in the series, even with its questionable ending.

The Dresden Readthrough: Ghost Story

We continue our readthrough of Jim Butcher's uber-popular urban fantasy series The Dresden Files today with book thirteen, Ghost Story. The continuing plan is to do a book a month on the first Tuesday of each month, and with 16 books on the publication schedule between now and when our readthrough is over, our reading list should be pretty full for the foreseeable future.

As for Ghost Story, in many ways this was my favorite book in the series so far, and in many ways it was easily the most frustrating.

The Dresden Readthrough: Side Jobs

We continue our readthrough of Jim Butcher's uber-popular urban fantasy series The Dresden Files today with book twelve-and-change, Side Jobs. The continuing plan is to do a book a month on the first Tuesday of each month, and with 16 books on the publication schedule between now and when our readthrough is over, our reading list should be pretty full for the foreseeable future. For those reading along, we are going via publication order, so our next entry will be the follow-up to Changes, Ghost Story.

As for Side Jobs, the tales within are about as mixed as you'd expect a short story collection of odds and sods to be.

The Dresden Readthrough: Changes

We continue our readthrough of Jim Butcher's uber-popular urban fantasy series The Dresden Files today with book twelve, Changes. The continuing plan is to do a book a month on the first Tuesday of each month, and with 16 books on the publication schedule between now and when our readthrough is over, our reading list should be pretty full for the foreseeable future. For those reading along, we are going via publication order, so our next entry will be the short story collection Side Jobs.

As for Changes, some mixed reviews had me wary on this, but outside of a pretty deliberate curveball, this ended up really restoring my faith in the series.

The Dresden Readthrough: Turn Coat

We continue our readthrough of Jim Butcher's uber-popular urban fantasy series The Dresden Files today with book eleven, Turn Coat. The continuing plan is to do a book a month on the first Tuesday of each month, and with 16 books on the publication schedule between now and when our readthrough is over, our reading list should be pretty full for the foreseeable future.

With book eleven, I feel like I'm sort of mired in the same midpoint I was with The Wheel of Time toward the middle, where not a ton is happening and it's getting frustrating. It's not to say it's outright bad like some of the middle Wheel of Time stuff, but I hesitate to call this book in particular good.

The Dresden Readthrough: Small Favor

We continue our readthrough of Jim Butcher's uber-popular urban fantasy series The Dresden Files today with book ten, White Night. The continuing plan is to do a book a month on the first Tuesday of each month, and with 16 books on the publication schedule between now and when our readthrough is over, our reading list should be pretty full for the foreseeable future.

The sixteenth book came out this past week, and it's really weird hearing some chatter here and there while reading this one. Even weirder is how this started out as possibly my favorite and unfortunately dragged a little until it picked up at the end. They can't all be crazy winners.

The Dresden Readthrough: White Night

We continue our readthrough of Jim Butcher's uber-popular urban fantasy series The Dresden Files today with book nine, White Night. The continuing plan is to do a book a month on the first Tuesday of each month, and with 16 books on the publication schedule between now and when our readthrough is over, our reading list should be pretty full for the foreseeable future.

We're now officially past the publication halfway point, and while I'm not sure whether this was my favorite entry in the series so far, it has given me a much broader appreciation for what Jim Butcher is accomplishing.

First and foremost, I appreciate that Butcher, time and time again, wastes no time jumping into the overall plot. Within the first few pages, we're right in the thick of it with some good action and a quick reminder as to where we're at. Yes, White Night like the book before it is absolutely another supernatural murder mystery (now with more serial killing), but we are getting somewhere with this in part as a result of the prior books as opposed to what felt like a diversion in the previous entry.

We get a lot of the old faves, from Harry's brother to a healthy helping of Murphy, and some of the most compelling scenes, for me, were with Harry's new ward, Molly. Both an annoying young girl and a precocious individual, she brought a lot of extras to the story both from a plot standpoint and as a way to fill in gaps in the story and setting organically as opposed to how the traditional stories went about it with Harry's random asides.

Also great? Butcher knows how to write the last quarter of a book. Without giving anything away, the final act of this book felt a lot bigger, broader, and badder than anything that's come before it, and while we've been conditioned at this point to know that Harry will somehow pull it off, that sense of danger has simply been transferred to his friends and collaborators now. It's a deft change of pace.

There really hasn't been a bad book in the series yet, but I really feel like the story is hitting its stride in a significant way. We've got a broad cast of characters that are being used for specific reasons, being introduced as meaningful and then having roles to play in harm's way, and there's no feeling of dangling plotlines or missing information as things come in and out of Dresden's world fairly regularly. There are a few things from the early books that I'm waiting on a payoff for, and I don't doubt I'll get them. That's good writing. Is the series along the lines of more epic fare? Of course not, but it also (and perhaps most importantly) isn't trying to be. It's a great sale with a lot behind it.

I am outright forcing myself to pace the reading of these a bit rather than dive right in on the next book. That's how good things have gotten. Ah well, months go by rather quickly, I suppose...

A fun note: if you're looking to five into the series, Dead Beat, the first novel, is under $3 for Kindle right now. Worth checking out!

The Dresden Readthrough: Proven Guilty

We continue our readthrough of Jim Butcher's uber-popular urban fantasy series The Dresden Files today with book eight, Proven Guilty. The continuing plan is to do a book a month on the first Tuesday of each month, and with 15 books on the publication schedule between now and when our readthrough is over, and perhaps our timing being good enough for the 16th, our reading list should be pretty full for the foreseeable future.

With Proven Guilty, though, this might be the first time I've felt a misstep of sorts with the series.

The Dresden Readthrough: Dead Beat

We continue our readthrough of Jim Butcher's uber-popular urban fantasy series The Dresden Files today with book seven, Dead Beat. The continuing plan is to do a book a month on the first Tuesday of each month, and with 15 books on the publication schedule between now and when our readthrough is over, and perhaps our timing being good enough for the 16th, our reading list should be pretty full for the foreseeable future.

After being somewhat underwhelmed with book six, I'm extremely happy that book seven not only got us back on track, but is now probably my favorite of the series. How does this keep getting better?

The Dresden Readthrough: Blood Rites

We continue our readthrough of Jim Butcher's uber-popular urban fantasy series The Dresden Files today with book six, Blood Rites. The continuing plan is to do a book a month on the first Tuesday of each month, and with 15 books on the publication schedule between now and when our readthrough is over, and perhaps our timing being good enough for the 16th, our reading list should be pretty full for the foreseeable future.

Of the six books I've read so far in this series, Blood Rites was probably the first step backward for me in terms of quality and enjoyment since I've started.

The Dresden Readthrough: Death Masks

We continue our readthrough of Jim Butcher's uber-popular urban fantasy series The Dresden Files today with book five, Death Masks. The continuing plan is to do a book a month on the first Tuesday of each month, and with 15 books on the publication schedule between now and when our readthrough is over, and perhaps our timing being good enough for the 16th, our reading list should be pretty full for the foreseeable future.

When I embarked on going through this readthrough, I expected to like these books. They're not terribly reviled by a large segment of readers, generally held in high regard, and so on. What I didn't expect was to continue liking each new book more than the one before it. I thought Summer Knight was great and the best of the series. How on earth is Death Masks even better?

The Dresden Readthrough: Summer Knight

We continue our readthrough of Jim Butcher's uber-popular urban fantasy series The Dresden Files today with book four, Summer Knight. The continuing plan is to do a book a month on the first Tuesday of each month, and with 15 books on the publication schedule between now and when our readthrough is over, and perhaps our timing being good enough for the 16th, our reading list should be pretty full for the foreseeable future.

As for Summer Knight, though, I continue to be absolutely shocked at how much more I'm enjoying this series from book to book.

The Dresden Readthrough: Grave Peril

EDIT: Apologies for this not posting on Tuesday as intended. Blogger kept this in draft form overnight.

We continue our readthrough of Jim Butcher's uber-popular urban fantasy series The Dresden Files today with book three, Grave Peril. The continuing plan is to do a book a month on the first Tuesday of each month, and with 15 books on the publication schedule between now and when our readthrough is over, and perhaps our timing being good enough for the 16th, our reading list should be pretty full for the foreseeable future.

As for Grave Peril, the short answer is that I ain't afraid of no ghost.

The Dresden Readthrough: Fool Moon

We continue our readthrough of Jim Butcher's uber-popular urban fantasy series The Dresden Files today with book two, Fool Moon. The continuing plan is to do a book a month on the first Tuesday of each month, and with 15 books on the publication schedule between now and when our readthrough is over, and perhaps our timing being good enough for the 16th, our reading list should be pretty full for the foreseeable future.

Anyway, enough chatter: Storm Front was good, but Fool Moon was great!

The Dresden Readthrough: Storm Front

We begin our readthrough of Jim Butcher's uber-popular urban fantasy series The Dresden Files today with Storm Front. For a schedule, the immediate plan is to do a book a month on the first Tuesday of each month moving forward. With 15 books on the publication schedule between now and when our readthrough is over, and perhaps our timing being good enough for the 16th, our reading list should be pretty full for the foreseeable future.

I've tried a few times to get into urban fantasy. Sometimes it's worked for me (Kevin Hearne's Hounded), sometimes it hasn't (Tad Williams's Dirty Streets of Heaven), sometimes it's more a basic plot point that overrides the setting (Max Gladstone's Three Parts Dead and the legal wranglings, Jim C Hines's Libriomancer for the fun magic system). The theme, however, has always been the same when I talk to people: you have to read The Dresden Files. So we might as well stop talking about reading this like I have for five years running now and start actually doing it, right?

Book one is Storm Front, where we're introduced to Chicago-area wizard Harry Dresden...

New Readthrough! The Dresden Files!

Many of you may remember the Wheel of Time readthrough we did through much of last year. Another series I've been told I'd love is The Dresden Files by Jim Butcher, an urban fantasy series held in very high regard. There are, as of this December, fifteen published titles plus a short story omnibus. My plan is to finish one of them a month and do a discussion post sometime in the first full week of the month (so, for example, Storm Front will be discussed sometime the week of 1 September). We'll go in publication order, etc etc.

If there are topics I should be aware of, or issues to discuss and look out for, I'm more than game. I've been hearing non-stop raves about this series for years now, so I'm looking forward to diving in, and I'm hoping others will, too.

Should be exciting!