Returning to Jim Butcher's Dresden Files

Dear Readers,

Four more days until Peace Talks hits the shelves and reading corners of the English-speaking world. These last two weeks, I've been rereading the Dresden Files in a sleepless marathon. After Skin Game, I noticed that there was one more book, one that I didn't read last year: Brief Cases. Here's a review of the second anthology in the Dresden Files.

In some of his short stories, Butcher takes a break from Harry Dresden and plays with some other characters. Anastasia Luccio, Molly, Marcone, Waldo Butters, Maggie Dresden and even Mouse get to narrate their few pages in Brief Cases. We find out what Molly did for the Svartalves and what she's doing for Mab as Winter Lady. We see new monsters that might or might not become important later in the series.

Harry Dresden gets to investigate some criminal cases again. Two short, but tricky magical whodunnits remind me of the first few Dresden books. And three bigfoot stories reveal what Harry meant when he mentioned that he had s'mores with a sasquatch once.

Like every anthology ever, Brief Cases contains one or two lackluster stories that don't do anything else than fill pages. Aaaa Wizardry, an episode that has Harry teaching some new Wardens about criminal investigation, felt contrived and illogical. But ten out of twelve made me laugh, gasp, smirk and wait even more impatiently for the adventure to continue.

Yours sincerely

Christina Widmann de Fran

Brief Cases: Stories from the Dresden Files

first published in 2019

ISBN: 978-0356511719

Get your copy on Amazon.co.uk.