HARRY DRESDEN — WIZARD

Lost Items Found. Paranormal Investigations. Consulting. Advice. Reasonable Rates. No Love Potions, Endless Purses, or Other Entertainment.

Harry Dresden is the best at what he does. Well, technically, he's the only at what he does. So when the Chicago P.D. has a case that transcends mortal creativity or capability, they come to him for answers. For the "everyday" world is actually full of strange and magical things—and most don't play well with humans. That's where Harry comes in. Takes a wizard to catch a—well, whatever. There's just one problem. Business, to put it mildly, stinks.

So when the police bring him in to consult on a grisly double murder committed with black magic, Harry's seeing dollar signs. But where there's black magic, there's a black mage behind it. And now that mage knows Harry's name. And that's when things start to get interesting.

Magic - it can get a guy killed.

I have heard so many good things and been told to start this series so many time and I FINALLY did. The only thing I can say about that is, “why have I not read it earlier”.

I loved everything about this book and world. I loved Harry, I loved his PI business. I loved the world and the magic system, the writing them humor just everything about it.

The world a little bit reminded me of Kim Harrison’s Hollows series, just a little in a good way, but it still was very different, and fresh.

I liked we get a bit if mystery, mixed with magic, and humor and a bit of smut inn a different kind of way.

As mentioned I liked the magic system in this book and Im looking very much forward to see how much more there is.

Harry, I don’t know what else to say about him but that I loved him, his character and humor but loyalties to people. But also that he has flaws and is a bit complicated. I can’t wait to learn more about him and see what he can do.

One of my favorite parts was Bob the skull, not sure why but I thought it was brilliant funny and a bit unique.

While this book was defiantly an introduction into this world and the characters, it was super fun and enjoyable.

I for one am hooked and can’t wait to dive into the second book.

I listened to the audio book that was narrated by James Marsters who did an outstanding job. I loved every minute of it.

I rate this book 5★  I could have rated it lower but it was a five star for me at the time and it pulled me out of a slump which is always great.

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Twelve-year-old Stephanie isn't happy that her family has been relocated to the planet Sphinx. It's a dangerous and fairly recently colonized place, so her parents don't feel comfortable about letting her run around on her own all the time. In order to keep her occupied, Stephanie's mother gives her a mystery to solve: missing celery. Greenhouses and gardens all over Sphinx keep getting small amounts of celery stolen from them, and no one's been able to figure out who's been doing it. Stephanie's investigation leads to the discovery of a whole new sentient species, beings she ends up calling “treecats.” She forms an empathic bond with one particular treecat, Climbs Quickly, and becomes a fierce protector of her new friend and his clan.

I'm a fan of “telepathic/empathic animal companion” fantasy and sci-fi. I figured I knew what to expect from this book. Stephanie would go exploring, find and bond with a treecat, and eventually be in a position to save treecats from some sort of danger (which she inadvertently put them in, something I managed to guess only halfway through). And I suppose that's how this story went, but the execution was incredibly boring.

It took a while for Stephanie and Climbs Quickly to meet, but I didn't mind that so much. Since I had never read any of Weber's other Honorverse books, I was happy for whatever background info I could get before the story picked up steam. I loved the scene in the forest, when Stephanie and Climbs Quickly met for the second time and fought side-by-side, and I was looking forward to seeing their bond develop.

That was where things started to go bad, for me. The story skipped forward two years. Repeated references were made to an event in which some treecats were killed and many more were saved, but that event was never shown. A bit of googling tells me that it probably happened in a short story that can be found in the Worlds of Honor anthology, which is good to know, but I still felt cheated as I was listening to A Beautiful Friendship and wondering why this interesting and important event was being completely skipped over.

The book went on and on about things I had trouble caring about, like the specifics of settlement arrangements on Sphinx, background information about several new adult characters, and Stephanie's shooting practice. What I wanted were more adventures and a closer exploration of the deepening bond between Stephanie and Climbs Quickly, not great gobs of exposition. The one thing that kept portions of this book from becoming an absolute snooze-fest was Khristine Hvam's narration – she was pleasant to listen to and did a good job voicing the various characters, although I thought some of her treecat voices were almost cartoonish.

Everywhere I've looked, this book is categorized as YA. However, even if I hadn't already known that most of Weber's books were written for adults, I would have been able to guess it from the way this was written. Adult POVs were used far more often than in most modern YA books, and most of Stephanie's adventures felt either overly brief or very carefully managed by the adults around her.

All in all, A Beautiful Friendship was a bit disappointing, but I still wouldn't mind trying the next book. However, I find that I'm looking forward to Weber's Honorverse books for adults far more than I am the next book in this series.

(Original review, with read-alikes, posted on A Library Girl's Familiar Diversions.)

This is another audiobook that's not really working for me - disappointing, since I had expected to love it. But it keeps going on and on about things I don't care about or that I already figured out, while skipping over the interesting stuff. For example, I knew the instant Karl appeared on the scene that he and Stephanie were probably going to become a couple at some point. I didn't really need the scene in which a couple adults stood around and talked about the potential for romance between Karl (15) and Stephanie (14) (Karl's a little in awe of Stephanie, and they've been spending a lot of time together while Stephanie learns to shoot), while also speculating that probably nothing will happen anytime soon (Karl is still getting over the death of the girl everyone had expected he'd eventually marry).

On an unrelated note: anytime food comes up the descriptions are so lovingly detailed that I want to cry. All I have in my office are Cheez-Its!

I'm starting to wonder if part of this book happened in another book or story, because there's this whole event (the murder/attempted murder of some treecats) that sounds interesting but that was completely skipped over. Also, with all the focus on Stephanie and Climbs Quickly, I had thought no one else had bonded with a treecat, but now it turns out another character has and other people know about it.

I'm pretty sure this is categorized as a YA novel, but it's kind of odd for modern YA. Adult POVs get far more space than usual. First, Stephanie's parents, and now MacDallan.

Stephanie just had an argument with Trudy, a girl who thinks treecats are pets and wants one of her own. In the next scene, Stephanie mentions wanting to travel to Climbs Quickly's clan with her hang glider, so he can see his family. I'm going to guess that Stephanie will accidentally lead Trudy (or one of her family members) straight to the treecat clan.