Tor Books Hardcover
ISBN/ITEM#: 9780765396372
Date: 06 March 2018 List Price $25.99
Author’s Website . SFRevu Post
Steven Brust’s new novel pits a team of investigators working for a secret foundation against a killer targeting sorcerers who also happen to be pretty terrible people. It’s the foundation’s mission to keep magic out of the public awareness and maybe keep the world safe from its effects, but if someone wants to rid the world of scum, and the good guys must stop them, who’s in the right? Tightly plotted with engaging characters and the solid prose Brust’s fans expect of him, Good Guys is a great addition to his canon.
A PI, a ninja, and a sorcerer walk into a bar. Hmm. OK, Donovan’s not a PI because he screwed up once and wouldn’t be able to get a license. Also because he got shot up by a cop for Jaywalking While Black and is legally dead. Susan’s not actually a ninja, because she’s not, but odds are that she could whip a ninja’s ass in a fair fight…except that there’s no reason she’d stoop to a fair fight. And the sorcerer? No, Marci is definitely a sorcerer. They haven’t walked into a bar yet either, but considering the trouble they face on a regular basis, it might not be a bad idea.
Donovan and his team work for a foundation whose mission is to keep magic under wraps, so it doesn’t cause too much chaos. The Foundation split off from the Mystici, a much older organization that doesn’t have the same convictions about chaos or the public good, even though they fund the Foundation. So there’s some common ground, even if they don’t see eye to eye.
When Donovan’s team is activated, they take off for whatever manifestation of magic needs to be shut down, assembling from their separate locations across the country by train, plane, automobile, or slipstream, which is the magical equivalent of teleportation. Slipstream is enough of an effort for the sorcerers that make it happen that Accounting is always on Donovan’s case about profligate expenses. Not that he cares. In fact he may take a perverse pleasure in not caring. Maybe he’s just getting even for his meager pay: minimum wage plus lodging. That’s how they know they’re the good guys; the bad guys make a heck of a lot more money.
The problem at hand isn’t a public show of the impossible, like that flying ship over Memphis, but a series of murders that look mundane, mostly, but have disturbing a commonality, namely that all of the victims are sorcerers in the Mystici, and they’re all serious assholes. Somebody is taking out really bad people who have magical powers and our team has the ambivalent mission of trying to find out who, and why, and stopping them. The question of who is and what defines, a good guy, is at the heart of the story, and the answers are hard come by.
Good Guys is a cross between a PI and classic secret agency novel, and it’s better than most of either, with a refreshingly contemporary air. Brust has assembled a cast of engaging characters that would serve him well in sequels, and whether this remains a standalone or not, Good Guys is a great read.