By now you should know what to expect from a Laundry
novel. Bob gets called in to investigate
a strange situation, it all goes horribly awry, & he finds himself
outnumbered and outgunned. And the fate
of the world is on the line.
This time around, Bob goes to America to look into an “Evangelical”
minister. One of those guys with a
megachurch & whathaveyou. He’s there
in a supervisory context, on loan to the Externals department (yeah, Bob hadn’t heard of those guys
either). As you can probably guess, the
minister is in fact trying to summon Lovecraftian horrors. And Bob & his “externals” have to stop
the threat.
If you haven’t read any earlier Laundry novels, this is NOT
the place to start. Stross doesn’t slow
down to explain the workings of the Laundry universe or the Laundry
itself. You will be confused &
lost. It’s better to read the series from
the beginning.
I was a bit disappointed that we didn’t spend much time with
some of the usual supporting characters, but very much enjoyed the introduction
of new characters. Hopefully they’ll be
back, perhaps even with some spinoff stories of their own.
Given that the villain of the piece is nominally an
Evangelical, I’m not surprised to see that there’s been a bit of a backlash to
the discussion of religion in the book.
Whatever Stross’ personal beliefs, he seemed to deal with religion in a
way that is consistent with the rules of the Laundry universe. It is a dark, godless universe where the “One
True Religion” exists to summon back Eldrich horrors. If you have personal problems with this
Lovecraftian take on existence, then this probably isn’t the book for you.
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