It's totally fun. The big thing is to pick which series to try. I favour the Constabulary subseries because it's high fantasy + police procedural + Holmesian pastiche, and I really like the protagonists. The Thorn subseries, of which this is #2, is (as I finally realized) superhero pastiche.
Yup. Same author, same world, same city, and actually a lot of the same (minor walk-on) characters. First one is Murder of Mages, second one is coming out in November, and I already put it on my TBR. https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/23590634-a-murder-of-mages
I suspect that sooner or later, the aforementioned constables will be tasked with bringing down Veranix. And what fun that will be...
Oh, FWIW, most of the negative feedback for Murder of Mages seems to be that some readers find Minox, one of the protagonists, rather trying. He is extremely literal, always pragmatic, and comes across as very cold. I loved him. He fulfills nearly every characteristic of HFA or Aspbergers', and I think that Maresca does a nice job with creating a neuroatypical character. But fair warning that a lot of people have difficulty warming to him, in which case I guess it's better to try the first Veranix book.
And the drastic definition might be my new favorite quote.
https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/23590634-a-murder-of-mages
I suspect that sooner or later, the aforementioned constables will be tasked with bringing down Veranix. And what fun that will be...