The Jennifer Morgue

[sawyl]

For medicinal reasons, I've spent a goodly portion of this week reading The Jennifer Morgue by Charlie Stross. Here are a couple of thoughts.

Tasked to attend a routine inter-agency liaison conference in Darmstadt, Bob Howard is slightly startled to find himself destiny entangled with a US Black Chamber agent called Ramona and told to investigate a case of zombification involving the TLA corporation and it's megalomaniac CEO Ellis Billington. After tracing Billington to his yacht, Bob and Ramona head out to Saint Martin in the Caribbean, for some much needed sun, sand, reckless gambling and dangerous driving. Needless to say, money is lost, minions are murdered, tuxedos are warn, cats are fed and we're deep in Bond territory.

While Jennifer Morgue may sound dangerously close to a Bond spoof, it's actually much better than that. Stross is carefully respectful of his source material and using it as a template, rather than as material to be send up. He is also careful to keep his lead characters interesting and likable: Ramona, who starts out as an obvious famme fatale, actually turns out to be quite sweet, while Bob is pleasant every-geek, trying to do the right thing, despite not having the first idea what the right thing might be...

In summary, I liked this book. It's funny, it's clever and it's willing to show why it's clever, it's well researched and well detailed, it's note perfect on life in the Civil Service, the characters are good and the plot charges along. What more could you ask for?