Whispers Under Ground (PC Grant) [Kindle Edition]

It's three months after MOON OVER SOHO. Peter Grant is still working for ECD9 and learning magic and now he has the company of fellow apprentice Lesley May, who's still recovering from the events in RIVERS OF LONDON and wears a mask to hide her ruined face. When a young man is stabbed to death at Baker Street station, Peter's called to evaluate the scene for magical involvement and gets a big hit of vestigia. But this investigation isn't going to be an easy one. The victim's the son of a US senator, which means that FBI agent Kimberley Reynolds is shadowing the case and her religious beliefs mean that she's not in the mood to hear talk about magic.

Peter's investigation will take him into the tunnels beneath London and deep into London's past as he discovers forgotten crafts, forgotten people and vengeful ghosts ...

The third in Ben Aaronovitch's PETER GRANT SERIES is another fast-paced, witty book with plenty of action and a twisting mystery. I was a little disappointed that it didn't significantly move on the Little Crocodiles storyline, but this does work as a standalone and I was pleased to see Lesley get more page time.

Peter is developing much more as a character. I liked the way Aaronovitch shows his flaws, particularly in his relationship with Lesley because he can't get over his feelings of shock when he sees her uncovered face - equally great is the fact that he gets called on it. Lesley remains my favourite character because she's a woman who just tries to get on with things but she's also trying to come to terms with what happened to her. Nightingale barely features in this book and the Little Crocodile storyline is barely advanced, which I thought was a shame although there's plenty going on in the main plot to keep me entertained.

The mystery itself has plenty of twists and turns and kept me guessing from beginning to end and I enjoyed the way that it brings Peter into contact with Tyburn and her agenda once more. Aaronovitch does a great job at building up the world in which his characters operate and it really widens the scope of the series and what he can do at it.

All in all, this is a thoroughly enjoyably instalment in the series and I'm really looking forward to reading the next one.

Karen for Big book Little Book.
Copy received from Netgalley in exchange for an honest review.

This is very much a grown up urban fantasy series where Peter Grant is our protagonist and often very amusingly, rather cynical narrator. He's a policeman based in London, about to be consigned to a data entry post as far too easily distracted for real police work. Just as he's about to resign himself to his fate he finds that he has an aptitude for sensing the supernatural. He quickly finds out that London is home to ghosts, gods, wizards and so on and it's up to the police to make sure that they toe the line. Any cases with a supernatural element are passed to Detective Chief Inspector Nightingale with the proviso that it stays hidden from the general public's knowledge and preferably, separate from their normal police investigations. Nightingale, a wizard in his own right takes on Peter as his apprentice.

In this book (the third in the series), Peter is asked to assist in a murder investigation, the victim being an American with a father influential enough to warrant the FBI being involved. The setting for the investigation is centred around the underground tunnels and the stinking sewers of London.
The pace of this book once it gets going, is fast and action packed. Yet again Aaronovitch's classic British humour is superb. He also has the ability to make you snort with amusement one minute and then feel uneasy the next when the scene suddenly turns sinister.

Inspector Seawoll is back leading the task force and any hopes that his own recent brush with magic will have endeared him to Nightingale's department and Peter in particular, are cruelly but nevertheless amusingly, dashed.

It's great to see that Lesley's presence in this book is much stronger as she joins the team, thanks to her recent disclosure in 'Moon under Soho'. It's also interesting to see how she is developing as a character now that her once beautiful face is now so horribly disfigured. It would have been so easy to just 'magic' her back to normal. Instead we see her continue to be the technically brilliant police officer that she is whilst she and Peter cope with her new found visual disfigurement.

Verdict : Murder, genius loci, magic and humour all in one book. Aaronivitch has done it again with 'Whispers Underground' and is my favourite book of the series so far.

Review:
I seem to be using the Line "Best book so far" in a few reviews recently, and when writing this review stopped to consider why, It didn't take long. Why would the latest book not be the best yet. Like all jobs you improve your skill with each year. With the job or writing I think that more and more with authors this is the case. There are very few authors that get so big they can just get complacent and churn out the next book by rote, they need to stress, to struggle to throw much of themselves into the art they love and we the reader benefit, from each improvement they make.

So that said: Whispers Underground...best book in the series so far? Yes very much so.

Ben Aaronovitch seems capable of pulling together Fact, fiction, myth, magic with a sprinkle of horror and a huge dollop of comedy so damn well its ridiculous. Since Rivers of London I have awaited each book with eager anticipation, because of the dry british comedy, the sometimes perverse sense of humour and the fast fast pace of the books delivery. His characters are so easy to relate to you can even find sympathy for the bad guy (see Rivers of London). But mainly you can become part of the story because it all seems so natural so like something you may do or feel yourself, you can easily see how it all might happen (which is a bit nuts when talking about magic and the supernatural) and yet the writing quality is such you just accept it and believe it.
Its authors like Ben that make Fantasy worth reading.

Very very Highly recommended. (one of my favourite books this year)

(Parm)

Description (From back of book)
Peter Grant is learning magic fast. And its just as well - he's already had run ins with the deadly supernatural children of the Thames and a terrifying killer in Soho. Progression in the Police Force is less easy. Especially when you work in a department of two. A department that doesn't even officially exist. A department that if you did describe it to most people would get you laughed at. And then there's his love life. The last person he fell for ended up seriously dead. It wasn't his fault, but still.
Now something horrible is happening in the labyrinth of tunnels that make up the tube system that honeycombs the ancient foundations of London. And delays on the Northern line is the very least of it. Time to call in the Met's Economic and Specialist Crime Unit 9, aka 'The Folly'. Time to call in PC Peter Grant, Britains Last Wizard.