The latest in C.K. McDonnell’s hilarious, fantasy fuelled Stranger Times series, Ring the Bells is a unique Christmas-time instalment, running the gamut of series regulars with all of McDonnell’s trade-mark irreverence and humour.
This a busy, multi-layered story, which throws back to earlier titles in the series throughout, but which could likely be read as an (I suspect initially confusing) stand-alone.
Dear Satan, all I want for Christmas is… wait….Sorry, Santa! Right??
Christmas has come to Manchester, and with it another potential catastrophe falls into the lap of The Stranger Times. A bookish triple-homicide forces DI Tom Sturgess to call in reinforcements, namely his not-quite-ex Hannah Willis’, and her merry band of magical beings. As they race against time to stop who, or what, ever has escaped into their dimension, the other members of The Stranger Times, Manchester’s foremost (and only) supernatural newspaper are fighting their own battles. An unexpected visit changes everything for Stella and Manny. A technologically gifted terror torments the ‘mainstream’ media, and also Ox. Brian the ghoul gets into the Christmas spirit. Grace answers a lot of phone calls. Banecroft pisses everyone off. Reggie… is there!
I am a big lover of this series. I enjoyed this story immensely, although I found the pace a little break-neck. I do wish some resolution came to pass in the Sturgess/ Hannah storyline, but that’s more a me-thing than a criticism! 4 stars.
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