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BILLIBUB BADDINGS AND THE CASE OF THE SINGING SWORD
by Tee Morris
Dragon Moon Press, October 2004
370 pages
$19.95
ISBN: 1896944183


Buy in the UK | Buy in Canada

Rarely do you find an opening sentence that completely sums up the tone of a book. Tee Morris, however, has accomplished it: "Chicago, 1929. There are a thousand stories in the naked city; and when you're a dwarf at four-foot-one, they all look that much taller."

There are only two possible responses -- either you just rolled your eyes or you laughed. If you rolled your eyes, this is not the book for you. But if you laughed, you are in for a wonderful ride. The whole book has a 'Terry Pratchett writes Philip Marlow' feel, managing to both use and poke fun at fantasy and hardboiled cliches. It's peppered with wonderful quotes like "Trouble is a princess in high heels," and "Driving on the wrong side of memory lane." But the humor never overwhelms what is a solid detective plot, with a singing sword standing in for the Maltese Falcon.

Billibub Baddings had been a soldier in his world, which is a fairly generic Dungeons and Dragons realm. He was part of a team tasked with finding and destroying talismans of evil power. They were successful, but Billi was a casualty, having been sucked through the Portal of Oblivion as well. In his case, "the Portals of Oblivion . . . end at the Chicago Public Library on 78 East Washington Street."

He hid in the library until he taught himself the language and came up with a survival plan, which was to earn enough money playing a munchkin at parties to set himself up as a private detective. Between the parties and the occasional divorce case, he managed to get along, until the day the inevitable rich dame with secrets walked in his door.

Julia Lesinger was beautiful, rich, and had been slumming as the girlfriend of Al Capone's right-hand man until Capone fired him. In this case, he was fired sky-high along with the diner he was in. Everyone in town knows who did it. What Julia wants to know is why. Billibub didn't really want to cross paths with Capone, but business wasn't that great for a dwarf, so he took the job.

Soon he is caught up in a dangerous web of shifting alliances and power plays as gangsters vie to take control from Capone and debutantes duel to get a lock on Billi's services. All their hopes and fears seem to revolve around a mysterious artifact that had been recently donated to, then stolen from, the Ryerson Museum. An artifact that Billibub last saw as it went through the Portal before him.

I have discovered that reviewing is a wonderful way to become cynical about the state of literature; so many things sound great, only to disappoint for one reason or another. BILLIBUB BADDINGS AND THE CASE OF THE SINGING SWORD is the Holy Grail of reviewers -- the book you would never have found on your own but can't praise enough. There's not a single false note, flat character, or unbelievable scene. The pacing is perfect, the mystery is tightly constructed, and the whole thing is leavened with self-depreciating humor.

Another reviewer has already beaten me to the Roger Rabbit comparison, so I will have to fall back on this -- if you love Buffy the Vampire Slayer, The Librarian, Cast a Deadly Spell, Pratchett, or Huff, run do not walk to your bookstore and pick up this book!

Reviewed by Linnea Dodson, March 2005

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Contact: Yvonne Klein (ymk@reviewingtheevidence.com)


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