This is a charming little novella in the Dresden Files saga.  Harry is approached by a young woman needing a skilled private investigator.  At first, Harry shies away but he finally realized that if he is ever to put the last events (see "Battleground") behind him, he needs to find some normality again.  And this looks simple: find some dirt on a sleazebag and lean on him to keep the young woman out of a lawsuit. Yeah…right…like anything about Harry is ever going to be simple.

The first big problem is that the sleazebag is as stupid as a bag of rocks.  The hellaciously horrific events in Chicago have been dismissed in his peabrain as the "heebie jeebies" which means Harry can't use a menacing demeanor to intimidate him because he can't imagine what would be menacing to him.  The second problem is that the pimp's lawyer belongs to the Winter Court and is currently employed by Baron John Marcone; so leaning on the lawyer is now out.  And because the little pimp needs the lawsuit money to pay off other bad guys who wish to whack him; there is little incentive for Harry to convince him to leave the young woman alone.

So what he has to do is peel back the onion until he can get the pimp to stand alone without any support.  Sure, that'll be easy:  talk to Mab and convince her to throw one of her own under a bus.  And then convince Marcone that his reputation won't suffer if he does the same to one of his own.

But then Harry finds an ace-in-the-hole:  the only lawyer to face Winter's lawyer in court and win.  Maybe he can pull off another miracle.

As always, this reader adores any story about Harry Dresden and this one is no exception.  It is a tightly written story that does just what the author intended:  give Harry a chance to make something right without it being all about great and/or evil powers; just ordinary human evil.  And he really needs this win to start feeling right about himself again.  But going against Queen Mab and the resources that Marcone has just might not be worth it.  ~~ Catherine Book

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