Book Review - The Man with the Golden Torc by Simon R Green
November 12th 2007 07:04
From the New York Times bestselling author of the Deathstalker and Nightside series comes a new kind of hero in an old kind of war.
All those things you hear about as a kid? The boogeyman under the bed? The creature in the closet? They're for real, people.
Eddie Drood knows they're for real. His family has kept humanity safe from the things that go bump in the night. For ages, they've held back the nightmares, locked the doors, barred the gates, and put righteous boot to monster arse on a nightly basis.
But now Eddie's in trouble. One of his own has convinced the rest of the family that Eddie's become a menace, and that humanity needs to be protected from him. So he's on the run, using every trick in the book, magical and otherwise, hoping he lives long enough to prove his innocence. And he knows how dangerous the Droods can be-because he's one of them
(net sourced)
I haven't read any of Simon Green's books before eg Deathstalker series but was intrigued enough by the book blurb to pick this one up and by the end I was pleased that I had. This is a good book, funny, well written in a spoof Our Man Flint kind of way. The plotline is your standard betrayal/find the traitor kind of thing but with an awesome cast of characters such as the infamous witch Molly Metcalf, Mr Stab, Subway Sue and the Blue Fairy (half elf, half human drunk) just to name a few. This story has it all, ghosts, monsters, demons, ufos, intrigue, magic and the usual inter/outer dimension beings all written in such a way that the story cracked along at a good pace and would be a fab movie( Mr Jackson if you are reading this). I also liked the first person style too and that it was set in the UK.
You can get the gist of the story and writing style by the title, with the next book being called Daemons are Forever, released in 2008. Overall a really good homage to the spy genre, detailed, funny (eg there is a character called Mole and he does live in a hole). As the book moves on, you start to like the character of Eddie and what he stands for, his jokes eg 'We're going to see Mole? Where does he live in a hole?' etc and the love/hate relationship that grows between him and Molly.
I read this in a week just in the evenings and it was great to read something not too serious or heavy going . This would appeal to all age groups and well worth a read.
kiwiauthor rating 8/10
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