The Detective

Not quite as fun as the first book, but still hilarious and a good read.

I forgot how much I loved the first book, and reading this second one has really redoubled my love for Cabal and the writing style in these books. I laughed out loud multiple times. Cabal as a character is great, even better now with the addition of a soul and conscience. And of course the whole murder mystery of it all was great as well. 

The only thing about this I slightly disliked was that the last story was so fully disconnected from the main novel that it was hard to pivot. I had to wait some days and read it later, and although I did like it I would have rather seen in separately in a short story collection of sorts. 

A second adventure featuring the selfish, amoral, necromancer, Johannes Cabal was an automatic buy for me. The first story, Johannes Cabal the Necromancer, was just too much fun, witty, and with a unique plot. This go-round may not be as captivating as the first, but it too is full of dry wit, and Johannes Cabal's unique world view. He's quite an interesting character as evil bastards go. I read this story punctuated by much snickering. This time finds Johannes aboard a very cool airship (a diagram is included) with a mysterious murderer aboard. He tries his hand at detective work purely out of self-interest, of course. Some parts of the story are much stronger than others, but I read the whole thing in a week which is relatively fast for me. I will eagerly snap up the third Johannes Cabal story (due next winter) as soon as possible.