Dead Men’s Boots

Dead Men’s Boots (2007) Mike Carey

The last book ended with Castor being booted out of his living quarters by Pen, and the Stranger giving him 30 days to find somewhere else for Rafi, or they were sending him to Jenna-Jane Mulbridge–a fate even worse that his current miserable situation, timesharing his body with the demon Asmodeus.

This book opens with Castor’s situation not much better, and the funeral of John Gittings, another exorcist (whom you might remember from the first book, when John almost got Castor killed, changing the plan to exorcise a loup-garou midway through. John’s widow wants Castor’s help to settle the ghost, and Castory (who hadn’t returned any of John’s recent calls) acceeds out of guilt.

With all that, Castor still doesn’t have much choice when a woman comes to him wanting his assistance in getting her husband off the hook for murder–because he was posessed by a ghost.

As usual with these books, what I especially love is Castor’s sarcasm and wit.

On the door frame there were a good half-dozen wards against the dead, ranging from a sprig of silver birch bound with white thread to a crudely drawn magic circle with the word ekpiptein written across it in Greek script. That translates as “bugger off until you’re wanted, you bodiless bastards.” Greek is a very concise language.

A very precise language indeed.

And some random references to very obscure knowledge:

“The name he gave her was Bergson.” I almost laughed. “I think that’s a pretty rarefied pun,” I said. “Bergson was a French philosopher back in the thirties. I think he had some idea about a universe of pure spirit. Kind of like Plato, only with a more outrageous accent.”

Plus, some occasional advice.

I’ve always found anger a good corrective to grief. Grief paralyzes you, where a good head of hacked-off biliousness keeps you moving right along, although it’s not so great for making you look where you’re going.

And as always, lots of fun words:

ongepotchket
abreact
shedim
spile

Including Greek and Latin, and I remain irritated that the kindle won’t translate either on the fly.

hoc fugere

I do enjoy this series.
Rating: 8/10

Published by Grand Central Publishing

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