There is already a lot of shit on Harry’s plate right from page 1 but in typical Dresden Files fashion, it didn’t take long for Butcher to pile even more shit on Harry’s plate. By this point in the series, Harry is so inextricably involved with most factions that I don’t envy Butcher’s jobs in (a) keeping it all straight, and (b) writing a story that respects all these connections. The Fomors were introduced in previous books as an ancient race of sea-dwelling supernatural outcasts made up of fallen gods, defeated giants, and outcast demons, as if Harry needed more baddies to contend with but Butcher’s philosophy is that more is more. The main plot of Peace Talks revolves around a… well, a peace talk involving the signatories to the Unseelie Accords (the Geneva Conventions of the magical world), and all the heavyweight “nations” of the supernatural world-the faeries, vampires, wizards, gods, and more-are gathering together under one roof to negotiate an end to ongoing conflicts, particularly the ones involving the Fomors. It is almost quaint how straight and masculine The Dresden Files is when compared to the influx of queerer, less sexist sci-fi and fantasy works in recent years. Sure, Butcher do try to perv on his male characters as well but I can tell that his heart (and his more southerly organ) really isn’t in it. I am not saying I like it or that I approve of it, but by this point I am pretty much complicit. It would be as futile as complaining about George R. We are 16 novels deep now and it is a little too late to complain about the series’ well-documented male gaze and Harry Dresden’s virtuous pervert persona who always valiantly held his snarling libido back with a short leash while he mentally leers at every female humanoid he encounters (which is present in Peace Talks in full force). I often describe The Dresden Files as a guilty pleasure of mine, and Jim Butcher keeps it firmly in guilty pleasure territory with Peace Talks, the first full-length Dresden Files novel we get after a 6 years wait. The biggest result of the chaos was that the Fomor, the undersea power hardly anyone had spoken about during my lifetime, had risen up with a vengeance, taking territory from various powers and wreaking havoc on ordinary humans-mostly the poor, migrants, people without many champions to stand for them. Some lunatic had managed to wipe out the Red Court of Vampires completely, and the resulting vacuum had destabilized balances of power that were centuries old. The supernatural world had been kind of topsy-turvy lately.

Peace Talks by Jim Butcher