Dead lies dreaming

Set in a world adjacent to Stross's popular Laundry Files series (starting with The Atrocity Archive, 2004), Dead Lies Dreaming begins a trilogy where the UK is under New Management and the PM is an Elder God. Wendy Deere is a thief-taker tasked with tracking down supervillians and, when possible, recruiting them to become thief-takers. But her first assignment crashes her into the Lost Boys, four young adults with magical abilities who rob in order for Imp to film his version of Peter Pan. Imp's sister, Eve, works for a megamillionaire hedge fund owner, Rupert Bigge, who is also High Priest of the Mute Poet. To raise the Mute Poet to the earthly plain, Rupert has instructed Eve to retrieve a concordance to the Necronomicon. Stross keeps the action fast-paced as the players cross paths and stumble from one outrageous plot twist to the next. Though fans of the Laundry Files will enjoy this series, readers new to Stross' world will also be joyfully whisked into this fantastic necro/techno-thriller.

The madcap 10th entry in Stross's Laundry Files series (following The Labyrinth Index), set in an alternate England where magic is a branch of applied mathematics that coexists alongside technology, finds the country under New Management, as the Elder God who now inhabits 10 Downing Street is referred to. Against this backdrop, the Lost Boys, a gang of superpowered transhuman heisters comprising Imp, the Deliverator, Doc Depression, and Game Boy, use their ill-gotten gains to finance a twisted, outer space--set movie version of Peter Pan. First opposing, then assisting, them is Wendy Deere, transhuman rent-a-cop for HiveCo Security, who has just been promoted to "thief-taker." When Imp's sister, Evelyn Starkey, hires the Lost Boys to steal the Necronomicon, a concordance of spells, for her billionaire boss, the job takes the gang back in time to the mean streets of Whitechapel in 1888. This is like a gonzo riff on Robert A. Heinlein's Magic, Inc., enhanced by imaginative set pieces and plentiful references to classic SFF. Bullets and jokes fly in equal measure, and even if they don't all find their mark, Stross still hits the bull's-eye with this fresh take on the caper genre. Agent: Caitlin Blasdell, Liza Dawson Assoc. (Oct.)