Mike Carey - The Devil You Know

Where to begin. You all know I love Urban Fantasy and the stronger the noir influence the happier I am.
Well Mike Carey's first Felix Castor gave me a serious case of the happies. Felix is an exorcist in London, he put up his tin whistle after an exorcism went wrong and is determined not to take on any more cases but in best hardboiled PI fashion he finds himself with a case he can't refuse. There are ghosts, demons, posessions, hauntings, deadly femmes and a good solid mystery in this one and the delivery was perfect noir.
London lends itself to dark mysteries and stomping about in the rain, it's full of dark narrow passageways and strange old fashioned pubs nestled between modern office buildings and huge sprawling buildings that have grown and changed a hundred times over the years. And this being England, it's often dark and raining.
Anyway, Carey blends his gumshoe style investigation deliciously with the supernatural activity and a little sardonic humour, it's not dissimilar to the Dresden books, but British and a little darker. The image of the modern world with magic in it is bleaker and the humour a little sharper and a little more sparse. The human behaviour in this book covers all sorts of weird, seedy, brutal and vile.
Seriously, I love it, it's perfect. I got caught reading it this morning with my first coffee in the office (I had about 10 pages left and it was only 8am) and have already ordered the next two online because in spite of the vile crushing death my TBR pile is threatening I won't be happy until I know I have more of these books.
So for fans of Jim Butcher or Kat Richardson this is a great series, a little darker and utterly wonderful. For fans of Raymond Chandler who fancy mixing it up with a little supernatural twist, you'll love this too.