Mild Spoilers Incoming!
I have been begged, commanded, threatened, etc. to read the Dresden files for the better part of ten years.
"You sound like this guy!"
Ug, no thanks. I have to put up with myself as it is, why would I want to consume more grade-A shlock? Just because the very few folks who read this blog like it doesn't mean I don't question my own judgment for writing it and y'all's for reading it!
"I love the characters and I think you would too!"
Go away I'm busy. With... stuff.
"This is hilarious!"
... so what? I go straight for dark midnight and you want to pull me in on the promise of a good laugh?
Explanation is not defense.
Well, finally Morgan did exactly what you do when I put up that much resistance: she just bought the book and dropped it into my lap, telling me to shut the fuck up and read. I'm not sure why I don't take offense to such a direct action, but I don't.
I mean, you told me to shut the fuck up and read, Morgan, so who am I to say no?
Okay, yes I sound like this guy. Over the last ten years my roaring self-hatred has gone from apocalyptic level storms to a merely horrific hurricane, so I can think that maybe it's good to have a shadow of a compliment thrown my way? PROGRESS IS PROGRESS.
And yes, he's funny. Probably in a very similar (and tragic) way that folks think I'm funny.
The author can plot like nothing else. Jeez.
Alright, so one of the things that someone brought up was the.... constant fixation on sex that Dresden has. Now, granted, when that complaint was logged with me I rolled my eyes. I read and enjoy Wolfe, sweet summer child, the stuff in here is child's play. Absolute. Child's. Play. In comparison to Wolfe's treatment on sex and women in general. Bob bothers me, sure, but Dresden himself? He screams trauma. Now, whether or not fiction could use more stories than recovering from trauma? That I don't know, but the simple fact of the matter is that most females reading this post were at least sexually harassed, if not assaulted, and male sexual harassment/assault is not usually reported, not directly.
We got semi(??) accurate numbers on one sex. We know we don't have accurate numbers on the other.
If you want good fiction you need honesty. Sorry, folks, it's the only way to really do it. You need craft too, but without that honesty something just isn't good. So if you have a whole bunch of folks writing about horny men who need women to keep them stable does that scream as a cliché, or that a lot of men in our first-world countries are in deep deep trouble and the few who care to talk about it choose fiction to do so? That the world most men are in is so against them that the only way they can grieve is by writing books about grieving, which then get construed as cliché?
Two young fish were swimming around. They bumped into an older fish who told them the water particularly fine that day. A few minutes later the younger fished turned to each other and asked: "What the hell is water?"
I'm going somewhere with this, folks hang in there.
See, the thing that fascinated me about Dresden the character in this book was his stubborn insistence on doing the best that he could with what he had, despite having clear preferences for the easier thing. It's a constant theme in this book: Dresden clearly wants to take the low route, but his memories of his mother, along with his father's strength, prevent him. Prevent. There isn't much of a choice throughout the book. Dresden just sorta gripes about how it would be so much freaking easier to just take the low road, and is bitter about how the one time he did take the high road all he's gotten for it is crap.
Bob aside, the through-line for Dresden is clear. He wants to objectify those around him and can't seem to bring himself to do it. His descriptions of people are clearly those of someone who wants to reduce the world to flesh and concrete. And the few times he talks of his family it's quite clear why he's hesitating.
And then he comes to the house. Victor's house. Now, one of the things that folks do not seem to get is that lust is a cover-up for heartbreak. It is not a proclivity so much as A solution to the problem of a broken heart. Y'know what another one is?
Rage.
Folks will generally oscillate between these two, if they're in this particular framework. Notice I said oscillate, not one or the other. They're two poles of the same choice.
You picks your drugs and makes your choices, childrens!
Harry is constantly, constantly, constantly picking lust over rage. It's not a great choice, but he's picking what he thinks of as the lesser of two evils and all that. But there, at that house? Lust has been set as such a revolting choice that all Harry has left is his rage.
What follows is a beautiful moment of Mercy. Harry gets a moment where, because he hadn't burned his previous bridges with his parents, his relationship with their memory saves his grumpy ass.
It's awesome.
Victor Sell, on the other hand? He has not. He's destroyed his family, raped his wife over and over, and decided that power is the only thing that matters. You've spent the entire book in Harry's head as he has to grapple with this question... and it's not even a fight with Victor. Victor doesn't show up till the end because he made his choice a long time ago. And so he's literally consumed by symbols of rage. I mean, you can't get more elemental and primal than the images that Butcher picks here. It's amazing.
So yeah, I found this useful and fun. I'm on board!
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