Review: False Value

False Value by Ben Aaronovitch
My rating: 5 of 5 stars

Four and a half stars.

Peter Grant has left the Police and taken a job with Silicon Valley tech genius Terrence Skinner's new London start up: the Serious Cybernetics Corporation. Or has he?

We are thrown in at the deep end at the start of this book with Peter's interview with SCC and then the first few chapters alternate between events in January when Peter starts work at SCC, and events in the preceding December which I found confusing at first.

I'm not going to attempt to explain the plot which would require gantt charts and a wall covered in mug shots and bits of string. Suffice to say that there is magickal intrigue afoot involving a mythical machine created by Ada Lovelace and Charles Babbage, a tech company with a big secret, our old friend Agent Reynolds from the FBI, some American mages and lots and lots of Beverley. Can I just say how much I love Beverley? The spirit/goddess of Beverley Brook, heavily pregnant with twins she is a sheer delight and I would happily read a book about her and Peter at home with no magickal crimes to solve. And of course no Peter Grant book would be complete without Nightingale, Molly and the Folly.

If you aren't already sold, there's some scathing commentary on 1960s British architecture (we're talking about you Old Street roundabout), a screamingly funny Basil Brush joke, casual references to steampunk and Peter's usual dry wit shining through every page.

Loved it.

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