Harry Dresden, Chicago’s wizard-for-hire, takes all kinds of jobs to pay the bills. So when an adult film producer hires Harry to investigate how he became cursed, Harry goes undercover on an adult film set. (Some jobs are better than others.) His investigation follows the deaths of several beautiful actresses, eventually leading him to the family of a White Vampire acquaintance, the suave, self-obsessed Thomas.
If you are thinking about starting this series, read a summary of the opening scene of this book: Harry fights a pack of flying purple monkey demons with magic and quipy one-line jokes, dodging flaming monkey poo, all while rescuing a litter of stolen mystical puppies. If this sounds like fun to you, there’s a lot more. Plus, the audiobook narrated by James Marsters is fantastic.
Compared to previous books in this series, Blood Rites provides a decent game changer in Harry’s life, which really helps add excitement and relieves repetition. The plot outline of each book in the series does tend to replay itself over and over in the following fashion: Harry is poor; takes a new job; wishes he had a girlfriend; encounters enemies during his investigation; re-encounters old enemies; fights; nearly dies; survives; still poor, but optimistic.
However, not all scenes are evidently necessary, and not all of them are fun.The disparate plot tangents often seem out of place, even after they are connected later. Harry decides to take on the Black Court vampires separate from his investigation and attends a family reunion BBQ with his police investigator friend Karen Murphy, where all sorts of family drama ensues. And Harry himself is hung up about over-protecting women, which is annoying, but not so much that I don’t enjoy the books. Be prepared for a detailed physical description of each woman who enters a scene, including their lack of clothes and sex appeal.
Recommended as a fun urban fantasy with a self-deprecating sarcastic and sensitive hero!
“Are you always a smartass?’
Nope. Sometimes I’m asleep.”