Lies Sleeping

I just finished Lies Sleeping after reading the entire series straight through, so this review is about the series as much as about the ultimate entry in it.

Wow! I've been immersed in the marvelous world Aaronovitch created for us, and it's a shock coming back. His world lives right next door to ours, changed just a bit so that magic is in use next to cell phones and deities walk and work amongst the “normal” folk. His descriptions of London and its surrounds are amazingly rich. The slang and British references are occasionally mysterious to this American reader, but I got enough from context to push right on.

I think Lies Sleeping might be intended as the last book in the series because it wrapped up pretty much all of the plot threads that have been building from Rivers of London to Lies Sleeping. If that's the case, I'll miss Peter and the rest of the characters. I can hope that Aaronovitch will give us more in the future, though. I will certainly be watching to see what he does next!

#LiesSleeping #NetGalley

This has remained a consistently entertaining series for me. I love how real Peter Grant and many of the other characters feel for me, as well as the realistic blending of police procedural with the magic and fantasy element. I also like the way that Grant is the narrator but he's not the most powerful and important character. The author has left him plenty of room to grow. The tidbits about London architecture and history are a nice bonus.

This one in particular was a bit distracting for me because of some repetitive scenes. Not once, but three times Grant is involved in major action scenes in combat with Chorley. It starts to feel like filler after two in my opinion. It is also a bit anticlimactic that Nightingale wasn't involved in Chorley's death. Unless of course he's not really dead. Always a possibility in this type of series.I also found Grant's kidnapping to be pointless. It introduces Foxglove, but otherwise took up a lot of time that I assumed was going to have a payoff in the overall plot. So far it didn't but again, this is a series so maybe the reason for it will be coming down the line.

That is unusual for this series though. Despite the ongoing Faceless Man/Leslie May thread, most of the time a story completely wraps up in each book. That's one of things I like about this series.

Another fun book in this series, and while I was afraid it could be the last, there's at least one more to look forward to, and maybe finally learn the entire story of Molly? I always love the Tolkien references, and with this book, Peter has finally, albeit grudgingly, graduated to the Silmarilion.

For about two-thirds of this book, the story seems fragmentary, there are a lot of different things going on but they're not especially interesting or engaging. Towards the end, it becomes more focused and exciting, but it also piles on the supernatural special effects, which tend to weaken the suspension of disbelief.The success of the series is based on bringing together the Metropolitan Police and the weird-but-plausible world of magic and more-or-less magical beings. As readers, we're willing to believe all this stuff for the length of a novel. But, when the author tries to take us to some other plane of existence outside the universe as we know it, the story begins to seem fanciful and less plausible. Fortunately, it doesn't happen often, but I'd prefer to do without it altogether. Terry Pratchett used to do something similar occasionally, which I didn't like either.At least a couple of good things happen: we finally get rid of the Faceless Man, and Molly becomes happier, gaining a companion of her own kind.Mr Punch created mayhem in [b:Rivers of London 9317452 Rivers of London (Rivers of London, #1) Ben Aaronovitch https://i.gr-assets.com/images/S/compressed.photo.goodreads.com/books/1401385034l/9317452.SY75.jpg 13552476], and I don't think it's much of a spoiler to say that he's still hanging around in the background. I don't want him back for a repeat performance; but Lesley still has a major unresolved grudge against him. In this story, we learn more about him.

Executive Summary: I enjoyed this, but not nearly as much as [b:The Hanging Tree 21479290 The Hanging Tree (Peter Grant, #6) Ben Aaronovitch https://i.gr-assets.com/images/S/compressed.photo.goodreads.com/books/1480443659l/21479290.SY75.jpg 40801856]. 3.5 stars.Audiobook: Kobna Holdbrook-Smith is once again fantastic. I'm not sure how anyone else could narrate this series. This is definitely a series that is “must listen”Full ReviewIt's kind of strange to be caught up on this series. I came to it very late and very reluctantly. In the early 2000s I read pretty much nothing but Urban Fantasy. I think I burned myself out. But more likely it's because I started to read a lot more fantasy and found that I just didn't like it nearly as much anymore. This series despite having a lot of the same tropes has still been an enjoyable listen. The world building is probably my favorite part. I want to know all about the secret histories of magic. I like how magic interacts with technology. It's been a bit slow at times. I like bigger stories and like a lot of Urban Fantasy you tend to get a mostly one off mystery story.The characters are good too, especially Nightingale and Molly. We add some new and interesting characters that add to the character building of the others.That said I thought this was a bit of a weaker entry compared to the last one. After finally getting some of the world building I was after in the last entry, there was much less of it here and mostly back to a more stand alone story. It was still enjoyable though, and now that I'm caught up I have to wait for the next book to come out.

This review is based on an ARC given to me for free by the publisher via Netgalley. This does not in any way affect my review. This book is slated for release on November 20, 2018.

In terms of themes, this novel covers more or less the same ground that previous novels have. While no book should ever be expected to overtly tackle any of the important socio-economic-cultural-political concerns that are at the heart of many of today???s issues, I certainly think books should at least attempt to address them in some small way. Lies Sleeping does just that, usually through Peter???s jokes and commentary, though Guleed puts in her own opinions quite frequently (which I like very much, given her background). This is a very good thing in my opinion, since the most important part of this novel is the plot, and anything more than what was done in this novel would simply get in the way of the overall plot.

And speaking of plot, that is perhaps the most important part of this novel. Since Moon Over Soho the Faceless Man has been a malevolent presence who acts through various agents, attempting to further some mysterious plan that Peter needs to stop... . Again I will not give specific details to avoid spoilers, but suffice to say that the Faceless Man???s goals are both entirely unexpected and also rather predictable given his background... As for Mr. Punch, his role in this novel is a bit hard to describe without spoiling it, but suffice to say that it is important and unexpected. ...

God knows why it took me so long to finish this. Not the books fault. I fully blame Kylux. If I could count all the Kylux fanfic I've read this year, I'd be done with my reading goal fifty times over. But since I can't, I'm behind.

But this book is delightful, as always. And what a surprise at the end! UWAHHHH!

How do I rave about a book in this series without saying the same things I said a few days ago about the last one? How about I just highlight my favourite bits: 
-Truly delicious show of power from Nightingale shutting up a mouthy lawyer/misbehaving practicioner, got all ominous in a classy way.  
- Foxglove! 🥹   
-Gloriously insane action sequence involving the repeated attempts at impediment, and dismemberment of a van, then wrestling inside a moving vehicle whilst dealing with a ‘stings on contact' Quality Street tin of piece of vampire (yes you read that correctly). 
-Talking fox and cheese puffs! 
-The bumblebee warelight! 
Found myself laughing even more than I can recall from other installments in this series and was very satisfied with the mix of a particular story arc completed and other story threads left dangling tantalizingly. On to the next!