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Death Masks (The Dresden Files, Book 5) by [Jim Butcher]

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Jim Butcher

Death Masks (The Dresden Files, Book 5) Kindle Edition

by Jim Butcher (Author) Format: Kindle Edition

3,553 ratings

Book 5 of 17: Dresden Files

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The Dresden Files have taken the genre of paranormal mystery to a new level of action, excitement, and hard-hitting magical muscle. Now, in Death Masks, Jim Butcher’s smart-guy private eye may have taken on more than he can handle...

Harry Dresden, Chicago’s only practicing professional wizard, should be happy that business is pretty good for a change. But he also knows that whenever things are going good, the only way left for them to go is bad. Way bad. Such as:

• A duel with the lethal champion of the Red Court, who must kill Harry to end the war between vampires and wizards...
• Professional hit men using Harry for target practice...
• The missing Shroud of Turin—and the possible involvement of Chicago's most feared mob boss...
• A handless and headless corpse the Chicago police need identified...

Not to mention the return of Harry’s ex-girlfriend Susan, who’s still struggling with her semi-vampiric nature. And who seems to have a new man in her life. Some days, it just doesn’t pay to get out of bed. No matter how much you’re charging.

Print length

464 pages
Language

English
Publisher

Roc
Publication date

August 5, 2003
Reading age

18 years and up
File size

1579 KB
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Popular Highlights in this book

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“I wouldn’t burden any decent system of faith by participating in it.”
Highlighted by 881 Kindle readers
“I wouldn’t burden any decent system of faith by participating in it.”
Highlighted by 358 Kindle readers
“Life would be unbearably dull if we had answers to all our questions.”
Highlighted by 341 Kindle readers
“No trouble,” he said. “Sleep is god. Go worship.”
Highlighted by 300 Kindle readers

Editorial Reviews

Review

Praise for the Dresden Files

“Think Buffy the Vampire Slayer starring Philip Marlowe.”—Entertainment Weekly

“Fans of Laurell K. Hamilton and Tanya Huff will love this series.”—Midwest Book Review

“Superlative.”—Publishers Weekly (starred review)

“One of the most enjoyable marriages of the fantasy and mystery genres on the shelves.”—Cinescape

“Butcher...spins an excellent noirish detective yarn in a well-crafted, supernaturally-charged setting. The supporting cast is again fantastic, and Harry’s wit continues to fly in the face of a peril-fraught plot.”—Booklist (starred review)

“What’s not to like about this series?...It takes the best elements of urban fantasy, mixes it with some good old-fashioned noir mystery, tosses in a dash of romance and a lot of high-octane action, shakes, stirs, and serves.”—SF Site

“A tricky plot complete with against-the-clock pacing, firefights, explosions, and plenty of magic. Longtime series fans as well as newcomers drawn by the SciFi Channel’s TV series based on the novels should find this supernatural mystery a real winner.”—Library Journal

“What would you get if you crossed Spenser with Merlin? Probably you would come up with someone very like Harry Dresden, wizard, tough guy and star of [the Dresden Files].”—The Washington Times

About the Author

A martial arts enthusiast whose résumé includes a long list of skills rendered obsolete at least two hundred years ago, #1 New York Times bestselling author Jim Butcher turned to writing as a career because anything else probably would have driven him insane. He lives mostly inside his own head so that he can write down the conversation of his imaginary friends, but his head can generally be found in Independence, Missouri. Jim is the author of the Dresden Files, the Codex Alera novels, and the Cinder Spires series, which began with The Aeronaut’s Windlass.

ASIN ‏ : ‎ B003X0AW6Q
Publisher ‏ : ‎ Roc (August 5, 2003)
Publication date ‏ : ‎ August 5, 2003
Language ‏ : ‎ English
File size ‏ : ‎ 1579 KB
Text-to-Speech ‏ : ‎ Enabled
Screen Reader ‏ : ‎ Supported
Enhanced typesetting ‏ : ‎ Enabled
X-Ray ‏ : ‎ Enabled
Word Wise ‏ : ‎ Enabled
Print length ‏ : ‎ 464 pages
Lending ‏ : ‎ Not Enabled

Best Sellers Rank: #19,405 in Kindle Store (See Top 100 in Kindle Store)
- #197 in Witch & Wizard Mysteries
- #233 in Private Investigator Mysteries (Books)
- #344 in Private Investigator Mysteries (Kindle Store)

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3,553 ratings

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Jim Butcher

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Jim Butcher read his first fantasy novel when he was seven years old--

the Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe. By the time he turned eight,

he'd added the rest of the Narnia books, the Prydain Chronicles, every

book about Star Wars he could find, a great many Star Trek novels and

the Lord of the Rings to his count.

So he was pretty much doomed from the start.

Love of fantasy, his personal gateway drug, drew him toward a fairly

eclectic spread of interests: horseback riding (including trick riding,

stunt riding, drill riding, and competitive stunt racing), archery,

martial arts, costuming, music and theater. He played a lot of role-

playing games, a lot of fantasy-based tactical computer games, and

eventually got into live-action roleplay where players beat each other

up with boffer weapons.

So, really, he can fly his nerd flag with pretty much anyone, and

frequently does.

He took up writing to be able to produce fantasy novels with swords and

horses in them, and determinedly wrote terrible fantasy books until,

just to prove a point to his writing teacher, he decided to take every

piece of her advice; fill out outlines and worksheets, and design

stories and characters just the way she'd been telling him to do for

about three years. He was certain that once she saw what hideous art it

produced, she would be proven wrong and repent the error of her ways.

The result was the Dresden Files, which sure showed *her*.

She has not yet admitted her mistake and recanted her philosophy on

writing.

Jim has performed in dramas, musicals, and vocal groups in front of

live audiences of thousands and on TV. He has performed exhibition

riding in multiple arenas, and fallen from running horses a truly

ridiculous number of times. He was once cursed by an Amazon witch

doctor in rural Brazil, has apparently begun writing about himself in

the third person, and is hardly ever sick at sea.

He also writes books occasionally.

Jim stands accused of writing the Dresden Files and the Codex Alera.

He's plead insanity, but the jury is still out on that one. He lives in

Missouri with his wife, romantic suspense and paranormal romance writer

Shannon K. Butcher (who is really pretty and way out of his league),

his son, and a ferocious guard dog.

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Ilya Korobkov

The series is growing a bit stale

Reviewed in the United States on January 20, 2019

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I must admit I'm going probably to stick with The Dresden Files until the bitter end, because despite its cheesy dialogue, annoyingly over-the-top AKSHUN and the protagonist that suffers from the extreme case of Retarded Character Development Syndrome, the series manages to create a sense of an intricate yet coherent parallel universe. Butcher is an excellent worldbuilder who with each installment somehow manages to add more and more vampire factions, secret societies and knightly orders to an already impressive roster of supernatural forces pursuing their agendas (and somehow always managing to entangle poor Harry Dresden in their plans), without making the Dresden lore overly complicated or boring. Besides, I'm sure that, in thirty or so installments, I'll know everything there is to know about Harry's tragic past, his mysterious parents, and his mentor's fate, if the current tantalisingly slow pace at which his backstory is revealed is any indication.

That said, the series makes it more and more difficult to persist in my resolve. I mean, this particular book features the Shroud of Turin (as a particularly powerful magical artifact, of course), a gratuitious bondage sex scene, and more lame comeback insults than you can shake your stick at. Oh yeah, there is also a black Russian man named Sanya who is a member of a distinctly Catholic knightly order but also an atheist and apparently a communist except he's more of a Trotskyist (wat?). Go on, read that last sentence again and see if it makes any sense. I mean, The Dresden Files has always been a bit cheesy, but until this point never seemed to unironically embrace its own cheesiness with truly disastrous results.

And one more thing: maybe, just maybe, Harry Dresden does not need to mention how he's sticking to old ideas of chivalry and getting himself in trouble because of that, every time he sees a nice piece of ass. I mean, imagine a female protagonist who says she is fiercely independent and does not need men in her life every time a male character is in her field of view. Yes, that's how annoying it is. Besides, if we're to judge by Death Masks, Dresden is perfectly capable of normal human interactions with women, just as long as they happen to be his friend's teenage daughter or an omniscient entity who is also a little girl. Perhaps he could expand this approach to the grown-up specimen.

30 people found this helpful

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Cheryl

Reviewed in the United States on March 16, 2019

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This is the second book I’ve read in this series, the first one being #11 a few years ago. These books can stand alone as the author does a good job of reintroducing main characters. I found that the plot in this book was high octane as in the previous book. What struck me in this book, though, was the amount of self sacrificing Harry Dresden was putting himself through. Is he a secret masochist? And though the author’s take on such religious subjects as angels and demons are interesting, they did not jive with my views and left me wondering just how far us humans can delve into such realms without getting hurt somehow. And I also wonder this about Harry Dresden: how long can he live such a dreary existence? His home is a dark, cold cave and most humans and supernaturals do not appreciate him, and he is constantly fighting. If he can expect to live 1,000 years can he realistically take such rejection over and over without becoming incredibly bitter or very, very weary? And what is civilization going to be like in a thousand years? Emotionally will he be able to keep up, wizard or not?

5 people found this helpful

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Franklin the Mouse

Chasing After Jesus's Death Blankie

Reviewed in the United States on November 17, 2021

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‘Death Masks’ doesn’t waste much time making the plot interesting. The book is the fifth work in the currently seventeen-adventure series. It isn’t vital that you read the previous four installments, but you will miss out some details and exciting events. Mr. Butcher has created a supernatural world that is a cross between Sam Spade and Harry Potter but with some graphic material not suitable for young fans of Hogwarts. There is a graphic sex scene.

Harry Dresden sure does have a lonely paranoid troubled life. The sarcastic wizard can’t seem to get through a day without somebody either beating the snot out of him or trying to kill him. A vampire group, called The Red Court, want him dead, a Chicago mob boss also wants him dead, and insanely nasty demon creatures want in on killing him. Dresden is a likeable sad sack who survives based upon his rudimentary magic abilities and friends or acquaintances that help pull his chestnuts out of the fire. While there is ample gore and suspense, ‘Death Masks’ also has its fair share of humor and keep the storyline from being a completely downer. It’s one of the reasons I enjoy reading Mr. Butcher’s Dresden Files series. Harry’s love interest is half-human and half-vampire and their relationship would give Dr. Ruth a nervous breakdown. By coincidence, we are still dealing with Covid and ‘Death Masks,’ which was published in 2003, involves the mother of all plagues. The novel does resolve the main storyline, but very deadly nemeses are still out there that are eager to kill Harry.

Mr. Butcher does a nice job of creating a magical world. I can’t stress enough that the five Dresden Files books I’ve read are adult fare. It contains hardly any profanity but murder and gore are common. ‘Dead Masks’ is a mystery adventure revolving around the Shroud of Turin. However, some of the clues are otherworldly and made it impossible for me to solve the mystery. It’s okay because the story and Harry Dresden are a fun read. I’ll eventually read the next installment because the author has proven to be consistently entertaining and is a nice distraction from more serious material.

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tilla

Lots of wild and crazy action

Reviewed in the United States on January 9, 2019

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Oh my word! This one's got some of the creepiest baddest bad guys so far. Between the war with the Red Court vampires and the Denarians, our hero is in a world of hurt. It's a good thing he's got some heavyweights to help him out.

His girlfriend's back stronger than ever. Michael Carpenter is back and he's got two other Knight's of the Cross to help fight the Denarians and even Gentleman Johnny Marcone helps out.

All in all it's a really exciting story and, even though I've read it before, it still kept me on the edge of my seat.

8 people found this helpful

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Flora

An Urban Fantasy Adventure With Non-stop Action!

Reviewed in the United Kingdom on July 22, 2020

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I've read the previous books in this series and really enjoyed them. The Dresden Files has become one of my favourite reads.

I love the way that the characters in these books are written. They're multifaceted creations that feel believable; they have depth and layers to their personalities. Good or bad, light or dark is an illusion, the reality is actually one of the myriad shades of grey.

Death Masks was more than a good story, it had everything that I look for. There's a great balance between the various aspects of this story: Mystery, crime, thriller, horror, detective, mythology and the paranormal. Jim Butcher blends these harder aspects with well written humour, love, friendship and hope. This mix helps to keep the story from being too dark and heavy for me. Death Masks also managed to surprise me a few times too. I enjoyed trying to second guess where the story would take us next and how Harry would get out of the various pickles he found himself in.

I bought the audiobook format as well as the ebook and alternated between reading and listening to the tale. James Marsters performance was fantastic. The pace at which he read the narrative was appropriate for each scene, while the voices he gave to each character added another level of believability to the dialogue. I feel that James has also personified our protagonist, bringing him to life in his narration of Death Masks as he has done in the previous books.

Death Masks is a fantastic book. However, it's part of an ongoing series so don't expect all the loose ends to be neatly tied up. There's no life-or-death cliffhanger at the end but although Harry may have won this battle we're left in no doubt that the war still rages on. I for one, can't wait to find out what adventures Harry is forced to go on in the next book.

M. J. Hutton

Well paced and enjoyable read

Reviewed in the United Kingdom on February 7, 2020

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The characters continue to flesh out and relationships change with some surprises in there.

Moments of peril for Dresden are pretty much nullified by him telling us the story... if he does then it would be a much shorter story and a rather abrupt ending.

This isn’t a criticism of the book more an observation of the point of view story telling that is common in all books that employ this method.

Overall I really enjoyed it and found myself planning time in my day to grabs a few pages or more.

Jim J-R

Possibly the best in the series so far

Reviewed in the United Kingdom on July 26, 2015

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Death Masks is the fifth book in the Dresden Files series, which tells the story of Chicago’s only Wizard Private Investigator. This time he’s hired by a priest visiting the city from the Vatican to help recover a stolen artefact, which leads to an intriguing and rather complicated plot which I’m not sure I completely followed.

There is the usual mix of apical action and witty banter, and a stronger emotional undercurrent than perhaps we’ve seen before in the series, as events from previous books are followed up and some plot threads are seemingly tied up. At the same time, this book introduces a number of new threads, which look like they are going to spread through the series to come.

While I enjoyed reading this, possibly the most of the books so far, I did feel that it was leaning towards the more implausible end of the urban fantasy spectrum, particularly in some of the detail around the scenario in this book. Additionally, the introduction of a range of new enemies made for a lot of new information to absorb, and I don’t think I managed to digest everything that it had to offer.

Unlike the first few books, which could be described along the lines of ‘Dresden does Vampires’, ‘Dresden does Wereworlves’, etc., this story defies such classification, and I think that’s a good thing - it shows a little maturity of the series that it can start to do its own thing, and begin to build up some of the ongoing plot threads that I hope build into something fantastic int he books I have yet to read.

One person found this helpful

catlady66

Again another fantastic read

Reviewed in the United Kingdom on July 25, 2020

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Loved it yet again great book hard to put down edge of seat stuff as always never disappoints these books dont worth every penny you Defo get your moneys worth from them love them so if want a great read plenty action but sex not too graphic either but just right and great characters that you just can't help root for then pick this and the other books in this fantastic series of books sit back and enjoy a world of fantasy and action and so much more in these great books I am now off to read the next one in the series book 6 Blood Rites hope you will too

Aleksander Cristea

A good instalments with some little issues

Reviewed in the United Kingdom on June 27, 2012

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READ THE FULL REVIEW HERE: [...]
[...]
Death Masks is the fifth instalment in the Dresden series, and I was hoping (expecting?) to find the same kind of flawless plotting and execution that had made me love Summer Knight so damned much. I wanted to be thrilled, surprised, amused by this book just as much as I had been by its predecessor. And as much as Death Masks was a good book, it just never made it to awesome.

[...]

The first thing that struck me was that every damn female in this book was attractive. And I mean every single one of them, even the razor-sharp-fifteen-foot-long-haired-demon. Harry appears to see women as curves, breasts, pretty throats and nice eyes. It happens when he first sees Francesca, anytime he's around Anna, and at times I think he does more ogling of Deirdre (the demon-girl) than actual fighting.

[...]

My second point of contention with this book was also one of the things I found coolest about it: the Denarians. Their concept is awesome, and they make for some kickass bad guys with a great backstory and powers enough to make them stay around and become a real problem. Their execution was what didn't sit well with me, however. I'm not particularly against shapeshifting, but when dealing with shapeshifting, writers need to think long and hard about what their characters are turning into and what that implies.

[...]

Nicodemus, head of the Denarians, seemed to escape the shape-shifting issue of losing any seriousness by, well, not shape-shifting. Instead, Nicodemus is the talkative type, whilst saying he isn't, and he likes to gloat. He would have been a better bad guy, in my opinion, had he been a little less one dimensional. But hey, I guess that if you willingly became a Denarian, you might just happen to be a bastard through and through.

Those things aside, the rest of the book was awesome. Susan returns for a brief period and she seems to have shaken off the I'm-a-stupid-woman-who-doesn't-realise-the-danger-she-is-in-although-she-once-did character, and is a much less annoying addition to the cast. Actually, Susan kicks some serious ass--literally, too, mind--and is much more than the plot device Grave Peril had turned her into.

Death Masks also sees the introduction of a couple of new characters. Butters is an ME with a strange sense of humour and although we don't see a whole lot of him in this book, it is clear that he is going to turn out into a rather cool recurring character.

We are also introduced to the other two Knights of the Cross who join Michael in this instalment to battle the Denarians. Shiro, a small Japanese man who fights with all the skill and might of a samurai, and Sanya, a agnostic black Russian with some of the best one-liners of the entire book.

[...]

Overall, Death Masks was a real thrill ride: Harry has been hired to retrieve a stolen artefact but when the Denarians and Marcone both turn out to be after it, the stakes are seriously raised. Add to that the death threats from the Red Court vampires, and the Knights trying to keep him out of the loop and Death Masks quickly becomes one of the most action filled instalments of the series yet. It's just a pity that the final battle seemed rushed and almost clumsy. But the ending itself is one of the most powerful ones in the series, and definitely not one I'm about to forget.

3 people found this helpful

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Jim Butcher
3,417
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Jim Butcher
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Kindle Edition
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Jim Butcher
3,081
Kindle Edition
1 offer from $9.99
Jim Butcher
4,743
Kindle Edition
1 offer from $5.99
Jim Butcher
3,091
Kindle Edition
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Jim Butcher
2,864
Kindle Edition
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