Book Review :: Rivers of London, by Ben Aaronovitch

Rivers of London by Ben Aaronovitch
Series: Peter Grant #1
Published by Gollancz
on January 10th 2011
Genres: Fantasy, Fiction, Mystery
Pages: 392
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My name is Peter Grant. Until January I was just another probationary constable in that mighty army for justice known to all right-thinking people as the Metropolitan Police Service, and to everyone else as the Filth. My only concerns in life were how to avoid a transfer to the Case Progression Unit - We do paperwork so real coppers don't have to - and finding a way to climb into the panties of the outrageously perky WPC Leslie May.

Then one night, in pursuance of a murder inquiry, I tried to take a witness statement from a man who was dead, but disturbingly voluble, and that brought me to the attention of Chief Inspector Nightingale, the last wizard in England. And that, as they say, is where the story begins.

Now I'm a Detective Constable and a trainee wizard, the first apprentice in fifty years, and my world has become somewhat more complicated. I'm dealing with nests of vampires in Purley, negotiating a truce between the warring god and goddess of the Thames, and digging up graves in Covent Garden - and that's just routine. There's something festering at the heart of the city I love, a malicious, vengeful spirit that takes ordinary Londoners and twists them into grotesque mannequins to act out its drama of violence and despair.

The spirit of riot and rebellion has awakened in the city, and it's falling to me to bring order out of chaos - or die trying. Which, I don't mind telling you, would involve a hell of a lot of paperwork.

Last updated on 22 February 2022

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I first knew about this book (and its sequels) when I was working in Waterstones in England. I thought the back of the book sounded really cool, and so when I went on one of my many book hauls before we left the country, I bought books 1, 2 and 3 (1 and 3 from an opshop, 2 from Amazon). This past week I finished book one, Rivers of London, and while it took me about 2 weeks to read it, I did really enjoy it.

What is Rivers of London about?

Rivers of London, by Ben Aaronovitch, is about a London copper named Peter Grant, who one day questions a man about a murder, only to realise that he is actually talking to a ghost. Enter Detective Chief Inspector Thomas Nightingale aka. Wizard, who is gains interest in Peter because not everyone can talk with the dead.

Nightingale is a detective who solves murders that have connections with the supernatural, the magical and downright crazy. Suddenly Peter is thrown into a world he thought was all myth and mystery, a world where ghosts give witness to murders, where vampires have to be blown up, where Punch and Judy shows aren’t really what they seem, and where he is now the first apprentice wizard in decades, all while trying to solve the murders of several Londoners.

My thoughts on Rivers of London

An urban fantasy murder mystery, Rivers of London was a very fun read.

Peter Grant, as a character, was quite accepting of the fact that he was surrounded by the supernatural, and while that’s not really the normal way to see creepy elements, it sort of fit with the rest of his characteristics. There were a lot of characters though, which at times made it confusing, but after about a third of the way through I think I had it sorted.

Speaking of which, the chapter lengths. Oh.my.goodness. This is not one of those books that you can read at night and think ‘oh, I’ll just read one more chapter’. No. If you do that you will be up past midnight. The chapters are very long, and while they are broken up a little within each section, I really don’t think they needed to be that long. Reading is slower, I find, when the chapters are long.

I did enjoy reading this book, and will definitely read the next ones eventually. It was a real bonus, I think, having been to London and adventuring around a bit, to know what he was talking about when he named streets and tube stations and things like that. There were so gruesome parts (hint: faces may fall off), but I liked the characters, the plot, and the crazy new things that Aaronovitch introduced. I think one of my favourite aspects was the awesome references to things like Harry Potter and the writing style. One of my favourite sentences was ‘I actually used the word “groovy” and she didn’t even flinch, which was worrying on so many levels’. Ha!