Ten Minute Egg

[threemonkeys]

Well the other day, I did express a liking for the “hard boiled” school of detective fiction. But that wasn’t the reason I picked up a bargain bin copy of Summer Knight by Jim Butcher. I read it because it is a Harry Dresden book and I have been an interested spectator in the car crash that was The Dresden Files TV series and I wanted to see the source material. A series that at its best was very good indeed but just as often descended to just plain awful – it is hard to think of another series so inconsistent on a show by show basis.

However hardboiled detective fiction is what I got from the book. Harry Dresden could easily be Philip Marlowe with lots of added magical stuff. I say “stuff” because it seems hard to identify anything coherent in the great gobs of standard fantasy tropes layered into the setting and story. But the core of the story follows the Raymond Chandler model exactly – the main character being dysfunctional with authority figures, the multiple commissions, the succession of violent encounters, the clues dropped in as incidentals, unspecified but obvious sexual motivations, violent deaths and personal injury for the main character who keeps going anyway. You get the picture – it would be mean to say that this is paint by numbers writing because it is very well executed and makes for an entertaining read, yet that is the impression. Then again, what should you expect – this is genre writing in an extended series – two genres in fact. This is what you get and judgement should be made within those parameters.

It occurs to me that the above observations are very obvious. The same thing, in all sorts of variations, must have been said by countless reviewers. Butcher’s work is very popular and the parallels with Chandler are not subtle. Except that I don’t know if that is the case. I haven’t read large numbers of reviews of the Dresden books, so the observations are new to me. After all, this is just a journal of my personal opinions. Chances are that viewed in the context of other reviews, what I have to say could be viewed as trite and predictable. On the other hand, perhaps that just means that everybody is correct.

I suppose I should actually go research all those reviews now to see if my supposition above is correct. Perhaps nobody reads Chandler and his legion of disciples any more and the connection does not get made. But, you know what, that would be even more disturbing to discover than the thought of being just one more voice in the crowd.

Comments

[lobelet.livejournal.com]

I don't think you said anything trite and predictable. It's all quite demonstrably true. I got a little fed up with the books after a while (probably because I read too many of them all in one sitting). I found Harry Dresden himself to be so much of an arrogant, conceited, patronising prig that I just got sick of reading about him. Identifying with him (as one tends to do quite strongly with first person narratives) made me feel soiled. He's such a despicable man!

But your comments are spot on.

[threemonkeys.livejournal.com]

Dresden is the sort of character you want to give a good slapping and tell them to stop being so pig headed. Its a point where Butcher does not quite get the Chandler thing quite right - Marlowe was stubborn and single minded but not to the point of stupidity which Dresden gets to.

[thoatherder.livejournal.com]

Chandler's books weren't about Marlow's growth as a person, while I think a key thing about Dresden is that Butcher is trying to show him as a flawed character who grows (perhaps too slowly) over the course of the novels.

Dresden is also suffering power inflation as time goes on, which is typical for fantasy novels in this genre and does present a need for bigger and bigger villains, and then bigger and bigger powers to deal with them.

The thing about Marlowe was that he didn't change, he just was. Dresden is a more rounded character with a lot more flaws, and therefore even more on the anti-hero side of the tracks.

[threemonkeys.livejournal.com]

I guess I'll need some more data points to verify that than the one book then - I have another later one waiting so I'll look for that character growth.