The Atrocity Archives (Laundry Files, #1)

345 pages

English language

Published Jan. 9, 2006 by Ace Books.

ISBN:
978-0-441-01365-4
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Goodreads:
101869

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4 stars (5 reviews)

Bob Howard is a computer-hacker desk jockey, who has more than enough trouble keeping up with the endless paperwork he has to do on a daily basis. He should never be called on to do anything remotely heroic. But for some reason, he is.

2 editions

Fun series starter

No rating

I’ve been meaning to read this for a while and was pleased to find it delivered what I expected: an entertaining mix of technology, bureaucracy and eldritch horrors (you can decide if the last by definition encompasses the other two…)

The narrative is in Bob’s first person, present tense point of view. I wasn’t especially taken with him as a character, though I wasn’t so put off as to bail out. He always managed to have the skills or items needed to meet the challenges before him, or some associate intervening at the right moment.

The office politics were boldly drawn. I wouldn’t have minded more subtlety, a bit more behind the scenes manipulation and gaslighting rather than the (office equivalent of) straight-up moustache-twirliness that came across. We were never really left in doubt of the outcome.

Overall, a fun series starter.

IT really is eldritch horror

5 stars

I got a new Kobo eReader and needed something to break it in. What better than test of a new palmpad than to read something from the Laundry Files collection?

This is the first in the series and a lot of fun to read. If you measure fun the same way as stepping into an abyss that's darker than black yet you can feel an otherness in it. Wonderful stuff really!

Unlike me, I have gone at this series very a-linearly. I'm usually a "start at 1, move forward sequentially" kind of person, but my book club read one of the later books about 6 years ago, and every once in a while, I dip my toe back into the seeping ichor, pick one at random and go for it, cluthcing my HoG the entire way. I'm trying to remember, but I think this is heavier on some of the …

Subjects

  • Geeks (Computer enthusiasts) -- Fiction
  • Intelligence service -- Fiction
  • Office politics -- Fiction
  • Demonology -- Fiction
  • Monsters -- Fiction
  • Nazis -- Fiction
  • Great Britain -- Fiction