A new "Rivers of London novella". A novella in that the usual suspects - Peter Grant, Thomas Nightingale etc. don't appear (expect in a short phone call). Instead we are in the US, in the company of FBI Agent Kimberley Reynolds, who after her experiences working in London is part of an FBI unit looking at mysterious things. Last time Aaronovitch wrote a story like this we were in Germany, and I remarked then how wedded to stereotypes he seemed to be with Teutonic bureaucracy and efficiency to the fore. Subtitled "they do things differently across the pond", here we get lots of Yankee cliches - including religion, guns and the frontier spirit. Kimberley is investigating, via a message from a retired colleague, strange events in a very cold Northern Wisconsin township. Lots of good material here, including disturbed native American spirits, and the practicalities in living in a northern US state in the winter. Kimberley isn't actually a magic "practitioner" which makes the book a little dry on the action front, but it is otherwise a good read, although maybe the narrative was strung out for more pages than it needed. I am impatiently awaiting the next real "Rivers of London" story.

Published June 2023.