Book Review – Amongst our Weapons

From Goodreads:

The ninth book of the bestselling Rivers of London urban fantasy series returns to the adventures of Peter Grant, detective and apprentice wizard, as he solves magical crimes in the city of London.

This next book in the bestselling UK series follows Peter Grant, an ordinary constable turned magician’s apprentice, as he solves crimes across London in a sensational blend of inventive urban fantasy, gripping mystery thriller, and hilarious fantasy caper.

Of course I was going to love this one. It is one of my favourite series and I dove straight into this book as soon as I got my copy home from the signing on Monday evening. I am only doing a mini review as I want to avoid spoiler’s and as this is book nine in the series.

If you are a fan of the River’s series this book will not disappoint. Peter is back in the Folly, Danny the new trainee in tow and there is a really interesting series of murders to investigate. This book also diversifies Peter’s investigations boundaries taking him further North than we have see him before to Manchester and into the old stomping grounds of DI Seawoll. I loved how much we got to learn about Seawoll’s personality in this one. It really opened him up as a character and I have a real soft spot for him, especially his no-nonsense way of cutting through the "magic-bollocks", as he would put it, to get to the facts which gave the book some brilliant one-liners that had me giggling. We also get some fun with the foxes as Beverley prepares for the big day.

The worldbuilding like that of False Value (book 8) sees us getting to explore what magic is and the potential for magic. This combined with the opening up of the Folly and it now having an integrated team is really changing the world that those in the first 7 books. We are getting to see a lot more of what goes on outside the Folly and are getting a lot more discussions on what magic might be and the potential it might have. This does mean we are getting far fewer Nightingale/Peter heart to hearts which is a bit of a shame but the ones we do get are very penitent and a lovely reminder of how much both characters have grown in this series.

The plot is also really interesting, initially it took quite a religious overtone which is was a little worried about but this did allow for some interesting magical philosophy to be explored. It also allowed Peter to talk more about the morality of his job both with the Metropolitan Police and as the Starling , Nightingales Protégé. These deeper discussions really do show the growth Peter has gone through and it’s really interesting to see those changes in his character with what he has been through in the previous books.

But Oh that ending! I can already tell a few people will audibly cry gasps of ‘Noooo’ when they read that reveal.

Needless to say this is a Rivers of London book so it is still jam packed with action, property damage, magic, geeky references and humour that I just adore. Its really clear where the next instalment of the series is going to take us and I love it. Plus Aaronovich eluded to lots of fun Scottish based shenanigans at his talk in Edinburgh so I can’t wait for book 10 or the Reynold’s and Nightingale Novellas that have also been promised.