Monday, June 29, 2009

The Dresden Files: Storm Front #1- The Gathering Storm by Jim Butcher and Ardian Syaf

Harry Dresden is Chicago's only wizard who actually has his name and number in the Yellow Pages under "Wizards". He's there to help if you have supernatural problems and have nowhere else to turn. In magical terms, he's a thug- lots of power, not much finesse.

But when he's called outto a case by his friend and cop Karrin Murphy, or "Murph", she can't resist ragging on him for his leather duster coat, which makes him look like a refugee from a movie set of "El Dorado". He returns the favor by opening the doors for her, which he knows peeves her off, as she is quite able to take care of herself.

But what he finds behind those doors is very sickening. Two people, in the act of making love, whose hearts seem to have exploded out of their chests. There's no sign that there was anyone else in the apartment or any signs of magical workings in the area, and that has Harry confused. There's two basic ways to do what happened to these people- voodoo, which would require a lock of hair from both of them, or Evocation, which would require someone touching them. Since neither of these seem to be the case, Harry is perplexed and a bit frightened. Both options would take a lot of magic. Murph pleads with him to help, and since he's a sucker for a woman in distress, he agrees.

But soon after, he is approached on the street by the bodyguards of "Gentleman Johnny" Marcone, a crime lord, and they take him to see their boss. Johnny Marcone doesn't want Harry anywhere near the case, and he gives Harry a gentle hint to back off. While it's not punctuated by the bodyguards cracking their knuckles meaningfully in the background, Harry gets the hint nonetheless. But he's promised Murph, so he continues on anyway, not agreeing with Marcone.

Back at his office, he gets another job looking into a man's disappearance by his wife. Even though the man has been missing for three days, his wife tells Harry that the man was interested in magic, and where he had a place to do it. Harry investigates, and finds a camera's film cannister in the yard. To look into the matter, he summons Toot-toot, a fairy sprite who lives in the area, and bribes him with food to look into the matter.

But then he is attacked by Morgan, a wizard who has it in for Harry due to Harry's justified killing of his mentor, Justin DuMorne. Morgan all but accuses Harry of the murders he's investigating, which leads to a trading of fisticuffs between the two. Soon after, Harry is back at home preparing to meet a Lady Vampire, but Bob won't help him construct a potion that will teleport him out of danger unless Harry makes a love potion on top of it. Harry grumbles, but agrees.

After that, Harry is off to interview Bianca, a vampire of the Red Court. But when Harry mentions the name of the female murder victim, Bianca snaps and attacks him in her giant bat form- because she thinks that Harry killed both Jennifer Stanton and Tommy Tomm, the two victims. Harry manages to convince her he didn't, and she gives him the name of an associate of Jennifer's, who works as a driver.

He calls her and manages to track her down, where she is driving for a rich couple, but she isn't exactly helpful, and her charges show up too soon for Harry to get anything. With Toot-toot's help, Harry tracks down a pizza truck that delivered to the address of the missing husband, but the Pizza Guy was awfully scared by what he saw. He doesn't want anything to do with that kind of stuff ever again. He *did* see someone in the back of the house taking pictures of what went on, though.

Harry goes to see Murph, and has a run-in with a junkie who's been taking a new drug called Three-Eye. It's supposed to open the third eye and make you see things, and now Harry has proof that the drug is magical- because the man sees Harry's aura, and that's not the thing a non-wizard should be able to see. But when he's talking to Murph, he passes out from a blow on the head he took earlier, and she eventually sees him home.

At home, Harry finally gets some sleep, having completely forgotten he made a date with a reporter named Susan earlier. But in the midst of a rainstorm, Harry invites her in and goes to take a shower. Still in a towel, they are disturbed by a knock at the door, and something mean and very powerful comes in, looking to kill Harry- and Susan, too.

Stark naked in the midst of the rain, Harry and Susan must fight for their life- especially when Susan drinks the love potion rather than the potion to escape. Can Harry fight off Susan's magically-enhanced designs on his body while fighting the creature's hunger for both their lives?

The book ends with a short chapter telling of how Harry met Murph, over the case of a missing girl who actually ran away from her parents. At the time, Murph is still a uniformed patrolman, and Harry is learning to be a private eye. When they run into a troll at a real troll bridge, can Harry keep the girl safe and keep from being arrested by Murph, or killed by the Troll?

This is only the first part of the Storm Front novel in comic form- the first four chapters. And it reminds me well of why I loved and continue to love this book and the entire series so hard- he's a guy who never gives up, and never says die. He takes whatever is thrown at him and throws right back, even if he's wounded or hurting or naked in the middle of a rainstorm.

The case here is sufficiently convoluted that you are still wondering exactly what's going on- but you know that *something* is going on- and that it's not likely to be good. And the battle in the rain is just all kinds of awesome- Harry is drawn as wiry and fairly buff and in shape- though he's more clean cut than I expected from the covers to the books and to the graphic novels as well, where he has some rather longish, scruffy-looking hair. Thankfully, his modesty in the fight is preserved through rather dark shadows and in at least one case, some puffs and streamers of smoke.

And in that, I was a little disappointed. Jim may not describe Harry as "buff", but the body he has in the comic is pretty ripped-looking. In fact, it's pretty much the standard "Hot, heroic male body", complete with six-pack abs and rather defined pecs. Okay, it might look nicer on the comic page, but is it realistic to the books? Harry's a runner, so I'd expect his legs to be rather muscular, if in a streamlined way- but the rest of him, too? I'm not so much with that.

Aside from that, this graphic novel does an admirable job of bringing the book to life, and I will definitely be buying the next volume when it comes out. Aside from some minor quibbles with the way Harry's body is portrayed, this is all kinds of awesome, and brings an already wonderful book to life. Highly recommended.

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