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A review by rouver
Ghoul Goblin by Jim Butcher, Mark Powers
3.0
"Ghoul Goblin" is an original story, not an adaptation...and has a terrible title. There is a ghoul & a goblin in it, but this is like saying Lord of the Rings should be titled "Orc Hobbits."
Dresden is hired by a police officer from Missouri to investigate the deaths of a brother & sister. It turns out the family was cursed a few generations ago, causing them to be targeted by supernatural forces or die an early accidental death. By reading the original summary in the back of the book, I learned that the ghoul & goblin were competing to see who can kill the most cursed family members to end a dispute for territorial hunting rights. While a contest was referenced in the novel, you never really know WHY they are having the duel. The fact that the family has been cursed is simply a means to explain why the family was targeted, as opposed to other people in the town. I think Butcher tried to insert all the plot twists he enjoys in his novels, but it made this short story a bit clunky. A family curse, a ghoul/goblin duel, a naga, and a djinn...it just didn't all fit smoothly together. If you're already a fan of Butcher's work, you'll enjoy this. It's a quick little adventure to fill the time while you wait for the next novel to come out.
They brought in a new illustrator with this one and I enjoyed his work. Cooper suffers from the typical graphic novel problem; a lot of his female characters look the same (I got a couple mixed up for the first half of the book). Even so, I hope they used him for subsequent Dresden books.
Dresden is hired by a police officer from Missouri to investigate the deaths of a brother & sister. It turns out the family was cursed a few generations ago, causing them to be targeted by supernatural forces or die an early accidental death. By reading the original summary in the back of the book, I learned that the ghoul & goblin were competing to see who can kill the most cursed family members to end a dispute for territorial hunting rights. While a contest was referenced in the novel, you never really know WHY they are having the duel. The fact that the family has been cursed is simply a means to explain why the family was targeted, as opposed to other people in the town. I think Butcher tried to insert all the plot twists he enjoys in his novels, but it made this short story a bit clunky. A family curse, a ghoul/goblin duel, a naga, and a djinn...it just didn't all fit smoothly together. If you're already a fan of Butcher's work, you'll enjoy this. It's a quick little adventure to fill the time while you wait for the next novel to come out.
They brought in a new illustrator with this one and I enjoyed his work. Cooper suffers from the typical graphic novel problem; a lot of his female characters look the same (I got a couple mixed up for the first half of the book). Even so, I hope they used him for subsequent Dresden books.