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Title: Moon over Soho
Series: Peter Grant #2
Author: Ben Aaronovitch
Rating: 3 of 5 Stars
Genre: Urban Fantasy
Pages: 306
Format: Digital edition
| Synopsis: |
Peter Grant must figure out why jazz musicians are falling over dead for no apparent reason [they’re jazz musicians, so the Universe itself kills them, duh!] and why there appears to be a rogue magician on the loose, when there aren’t supposed to be ANY magicians on the loose, rogue or otherwise.
| My Thoughts: |
First. Jazz. I hate the stuff. I’d stick one those super long q-tips from Nightmare on Elm Street into my brain before voluntarily listening to the stuff. I find it disgusting. So to have the whole book be about jazz musicians did me no favors whatsoever.
Second, and more important, was the gratuitous lust scenes between Grant and one of the side characters in this book. It bordered on the pornographic and was not something I want in my entertainment. Making the connection between Grant and the character, Simone could have been handled so much less sleasily and still gotten the same affect at the end of the book.
My respect for Aaronovitch took a nosedive and I don’t plan on reading any more of the Peter Grant/Rivers of London books.
★★★☆☆
When I did my audiobook re-read of this earlier this year, I was stunned how detailed the sex scenes were. Couldn’t believe I made it through the book before, much less that I’ve read everything in the series (which doesn’t even come close to matching this book)
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Yeah, too late for Aaronovich. For me, this wasn’t a mis-step. More like a fall of a cliff. While you say nothing comes close to this, and I trust you are telling the truth, I can’t trust Aaronovich not to do this again.
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Which is why I won’t try to encourage you to continue — if it was all the jazz (just sooo much jazz), I’d tell you to shake it off and that you’d be able to handle the little bits that showed up later. But that’s a line I wouldn’t try to get you to cross.for just that reason.
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And I appreciate that 🙂
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I imagine a detailed sex scene would be much worse by audio tape. It’s so much easier to skip over stuff in paper format but audio tapes draw every word out.
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Exactly
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Exactly why I probably don’t remember reading them, but it’ll be a while before I can forget now
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That does not sound convincing. I join the anti-Jazz-group – never understood this ‘music’ 😀
Nah, I’m glad I never picked those books up – I almost did a couple of years ago when they were really popular in Germany.
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Now you have good reasons to backup your actions 🙂
And this is why I hate “popular” books. There is usually something that slaps me across the face in them.
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I can relate to that.. That’s why I am extra suspicious when I come across hyped books.
And I am really surprised to hear this one contains detailed sex scenes. Didn’t expect it at all from this book series. Doesn’t seem like it would fit! (Well, and obviously it doesn’t! 😀 )
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Yeah, not sure what Aaronovich was thinking with the sleaze.
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We now all know that force-feeding you jazz is the absolute and best torture strategy. *preps an evil plan* Sorry to hear this marked the end of your journey into this series though.
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Yeah, you want to torture me, jazz will do it.
I thought I had found another urban fantasy series that I could enjoy, since I enjoy so few of them. So it hits kind of hard…
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Wow, as hard as I’m trying, I can’t seem to recall this pornographic lust scene in this book, and you’d think something like that would stick out! What does that say about me? 😛
Anyway, it’s too bad Aaronovitch blew it with you, but I understand how everyone has a line. I still love this series and can’t wait for the next one 🙂
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At least there wasn’t any actual jazz playing, unless your mind does that thing where it fills in what you’d expect to hear. Then you’d just be tormenting yourself!
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Thankfully, my mind doesn’t do that. Something I’m thankful for this time around 🙂
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I guess porn has conventions, and those conventions can be described as technique. Technique is essential to artistic production, therefore porn qualifies as art (this is a point divorced from questions of ethics or responsibility, which is not to suggest these questions are unimportant). The difficulty, I think, is that heterosexual pornorgraphy’s techniques are fundamentally about objectifying women and facilitate the female gaze to a far lesser degree (which is not to say that women can’t find pleasures in the same films). Porn can also cater intently to female viewers, and indeed does; just as porn caters to the queer gaze as well. I’m not making a value judgement about anything here particularly. This is difficult moral and thematic territory.
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Going to have to vehemently disagree with you on this Manuel.
Porn is filth. It is not art. It takes something that is meant to be good and totally misuses and abuses it. It destroys relationships between married couples, it destroys the relationship between male and female in general and it is as addictive as any drug.
Porn’s objective is to inflame the viewer with impossible scenarios and ideas, so the viewer comes back for more as they can’t find such things in real life.
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sorry. miscommunication. I was afraid this would happen. It depends on your definition of porn as art. there’s a thing called porn in art.
Here’s an example of what I’m talking about:
http://manuelaantao.blogspot.pt/2015/09/the-collectors-eye-joe-berardo-flesh.html
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Definitely depends on your definitions of both porn AND art.
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http://manuelaantao.blogspot.pt/2015/09/the-collectors-eye-joe-berardo-flesh.html
Some people told me it was porn. Don’t agree. It’s art. But what is one man’s art is another man’s porn. That’s the nature of the beast…
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Wow, I’m glad you called that out. I mildly liked the first one and had planned to read the second one if it ever went on sale. Thanks for taking the bullet for me!
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No problem. This is part of why we review after all, isn’t it?
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Absolutely.
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While I feel no particular form of “hate” for jazz, it’s not my preferred musical genre, but still I might try this series because I keep hearing good things about it. That said, I’m sorry it didn’t work for you – and not just for the music…
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I never thought I would hate a particular type of music either. Disgust, maybe some snobbishness, but hate? Nahh, I didn’t care enough.
Then I heard some extended jazz and it just rubbed me the wrong way. There was no live and let live, like my deal with Death Speed Ultra Metal [insert as many adjectives as you please before “metal”]
😀
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“they’re jazz musicians, so the Universe itself kills them, duh!”
Homicide detective claps his notebook shut. “I guess we can close out these cases, then. Where are we headed for lunch?”
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See, now you know WHY you always see fat detectives on tv. They’re the jazz branch.
Highly coveted position and other cops are always discrediting the current ones so that they can get in on the action, or lack of action.
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I do have a copy of this one and always intended catching up with this series. I’m intrigued by your review to see how it compares with No1.
Lynn 😀
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Best of luck to you.
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I’m sorry that you & Peter aren’t getting along! I’m fond of him. But we each have our own tastes and there are plenty of books out there! Good luck with your next choice!
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Thanks.
I was just thinking the other day about HOW MANY books there are. It is incredible and it’s a good thing with so many different peoples’ tastes…
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Sometimes I find it overwhelming! There are just so many books that I’d like to read, how do I choose the next one? We are so lucky!
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*I can’t hear you I’m listening to Louis Armstrong*
….not even joking…
To be fair, I’d rather listen than read about it and had already given up on the series, but I’m sorry this didn’t work for you though.
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*I’d rather listen *to jazz* than read about it (considering your other contention with this book, I figured I’d clarify, don’t want that to be misread lol!)
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I figured but thank you for clarifying 😀
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Hehe no problem 😉
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Well, you know, what with the recent handcuff picture, you can’t take these things for granted!
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😂😂😂
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