Hard-boiled detective story +
A world with magic wielders = Larry Correia’s “Grimnoir” world.
In addition to being a great name for a genre, “Grimnoir” is a great
concept for a genre. The story takes
place in the early 1930s, about 80 years after powers emerged. At this point,
about 1% of the population has powers. About 10%of these have enough power to
be considered an “active.” The presence of magic during this period has changed
world events, adding “alternate history” to the book’s mix of genres. In this
world, the Titanic didn’t sink, Hitler was assassinated early in his political
career, and Tesla’s Peace Ray ended the Great War.
PI Jake Sullivan has the stereotypical
hardboiled attitude that comes with literary interpretations of his profession.
He is an ex-con, as well as a military vet. But he is also an active, possessing
the talent to make nearby objects light as a feather or as heavy as lead. So
the government turns to Jake to take down a suspected killer who's been engaged
in a magic-powered crime spree.
By the time Jake realizes that
the girl behind the robberies is an old friend, he realizes that the G-Men have
pulled him into a secret war between opposing groups of magic-users. And both groups
have powerful powers on their side.
The novel presented these
emerging powers as magic-based, although the source of those powers is not revealed.
But as a comic book fan, I categorized these as “super-powers,” and that
reading worked. The range of powers that Correia comes up with are interesting,
and the uses that he finds for these powers is unpredictable.
There are at least two more
novels in the series, and I anticipate checking out the next one. I like the
world, I like most of the main characters, and want to see where the story is
headed.
Source: public library
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