March to Other Worlds Day 21 The Garret Files by Glen Cook
March to Other Worlds Day 21 The Garret Files by Glen Cook
As we close out the third week of this year’s March, I’d like to introduce readers to one of the most influential fantasy series of modern times—Glen Cook’s The Garret Files.
It seems unfair that Glen Cook should be the master of both the fantasy warfare genre (The Black Company) and the fantasy detective novel (The Garrett Files) but he undeniably is. Of the two genres, I suspect that the fantasy detective series is the most difficult. Not only does he have to have memorable characters whom the readers can love to cheer for (and against), exciting action scenes, magic that enhances the story without overwhelming it, and a believable fantasy back drop, he has to come up with a credible, multi-layered mystery. Cook does this in The Garrett Files by adopting the Nero Wolfe template with his character the Dead Man (four centuries in the grave but not ready to move on yet) playing Wolfe and his hero, Garrett, filling the shoes of Archie Goodwin (drinking beer instead of milk, but otherwise pretty much the same). Add in a growing cast of memorable friends and you have the recipe for outstanding mysteries in a remarkably fresh setting.
The first book in the series, Sweet Silver Blues, is one of my favorite Glen Cook books of all times. I’ve read it five or six times in the last three decades. It inspired my best friend to run an awesome D&D game that lasted eight years, and it leads to 13 mostly good sequels and countless copycats. The series is about Garrett, an ex-Marine turned private investigator in the fantasy city of TunFaire. There’s a lot of action, but there’s also a very good mystery and a surprisingly strong chord played on the heartstrings by the end of the book. The characters are memorable and the world is ever more fascinating.
This first novel revolves around Garrett being hired to find the woman his old army buddy has left a fortune too. She’s in a realm called the Cantard which has been the focus of generational warfare between the wizards of his kingdom and their enemies. From the very beginning multiple groups of mysterious bad guys are showing too much (often violent) interest in Garrett’s mission and Cook plays these competing plotlines brilliantly to keep the adventure both fast-paced and always interesting. But the reason I keep coming back to this novel is the last five sentences of the second to last chapter—the true end of a brilliant novel. With five short sentences Cook transforms a triumphant ending into one which makes you want to weep.
In doing so he gives Garrett a depth worthy of a hundred sequels.
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