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Paul Cornell

London Falling (The Shadow Police, 1) Mass Market Paperback – February 25, 2014

by Paul Cornell (Author)

4.2 2,362 ratings

Book 1 of 3: Shadow Police series

Editors' pick Best Science Fiction & Fantasy

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London Falling by Paul Cornell is an urban fantasy twist on the classic police procedural: London cops versus magical creatures of night

Police officers Quill, Costain, Sefton, and Ross know the worst of London―or they think they do. While investigating a mobster's mysterious death, they come into contact with a strange artifact and accidentally develop the Sight. Suddenly they can see the true evil haunting London's streets.

Armed with police instincts and procedures, the four officers take on the otherworldly creatures secretly prowling London. Football lore and the tragic history of a Tudor queen become entwined in their pursuit of an age-old witch with a penchant for child sacrifice. But when London's monsters become aware of their meddling, the officers must decide what they are willing to sacrifice to clean up their city.

Book 1 of 3

Shadow Police series
Print length

432 pages
Language

English
Publisher

Tor Fantasy
Publication date

February 25, 2014
Dimensions

4.22 x 1.17 x 6.78 inches
ISBN-10

0765368102
ISBN-13

978-0765368102
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Benedict Jacka
1,868
Mass Market Paperback
35 offers from $1.74
Benedict Jacka
2,601
Mass Market Paperback
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Editorial Reviews

About the Author

Paul Cornell has written episodes of Elementary, Doctor Who, Primeval, Robin Hood and many other TV series, including his own children’s show, Wavelength. He’s worked for every major comics company, including his creator-owned series Saucer State for IDW and This Damned Band for Dark Horse, and runs for Marvel and DC on Batman and Robin, Wolverine and Young Avengers. He’s the writer of the Lychford rural fantasy novellas from Tor.com Publishing. He’s won the BSFA Award for his short fiction, an Eagle Award for his comics, a Hugo Award for his podcast and shares in a Writer’s Guild Award for his Doctor Who. He’s the co-host of Hammer House of Podcast.

Product details

Publisher ‏ : ‎ Tor Fantasy (February 25, 2014)
Language ‏ : ‎ English
Mass Market Paperback ‏ : ‎ 432 pages
ISBN-10 ‏ : ‎ 0765368102
ISBN-13 ‏ : ‎ 978-0765368102
Item Weight ‏ : ‎ 7.2 ounces
Dimensions ‏ : ‎ 4.22 x 1.17 x 6.78 inches

Best Sellers Rank: #2,730,995 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
- #6,368 in Witch & Wizard Mysteries
- #28,283 in Police Procedurals (Books)
- #57,239 in Paranormal & Urban Fantasy (Books)

Customer Reviews:
4.2 2,362 ratings

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Paul Cornell

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I'm a writer of Science Fiction and Fantasy in prose, comics and television, one of only two people to be Hugo Award-nominated in all three media. I've written Doctor Who for the BBC, Wolverine for Marvel Comics and Batman and Robin for DC. I've won the BSFA Award for my short fiction, an Eagle Award for my comics, and share in a Writer's Guild Award for my television scripts. My urban fantasy novels for Tor are London Falling and The Severed Streets.

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4.2 out of 5

2,362 global ratings

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"It felt like what you might be left with if you had nothing else in the world."

Reviewed in the United States on April 19, 2013

Verified Purchase

Mora Losley has tremendous power which appears early on in this book. A mob sting operation has unexpectedly and literally blows up. A strange amalgamation of four detectives are assigned to investigate a series of events that just get eeriest and more horrifying by the minute.

This squad is a strong dimension of this book. Each has an inner demon, and each believes themselves doomed. Ross is the niece of a ruling mob boss who has taken refuge in the processing of police intelligence. She still has the broken nose of an encounter with Mora that was inflicted to force her away from insisting her father had not been a suicide, but a victim of murder. Costain is a slightly soiled undercover in the original sting. He starts with a guilty enmity toward the other undercover detective is Sefton, he is a secret gay man who is convinced the world knows his story. To make these two more interesting, they are both black but Costain grew up tough while Sefton was raised as a tosh. He was wealthy but a misfit. Finally Quill is convinced he is a bad man and that something truly horrible is missing from his consciousness.

A second intriguing aspect of the book is that this quartet are inflicted with "the sight". They see the power referenced in my title. It is a weird uncanny range of sights. They see genuine ghosts, memory traces, and lurking darkness. Mora seems to be a locus of the horror, but then perhaps not. We never really get a cohesive view of the entities. This however is a slightly irritating underpinning of what I believe is the start of a series.

The plot is engaging and entices the reader. For me it dragged on a tad too long. Some of the symbolism of the underworld and the references to the under city felt as if it is referencing Mieville. The interactions of the squads with the Power are the most compelling aspects of the story.

I give this book 3.5 stars. I enjoyed reading it, and I think people who like the genre of the supernatural would like this book. I subtract for the unreferenced Mieville devices and for dragging the story line a bit too long. That being said, if the sequel does in fact appear, I will read it. I also believe the series will improve with some of the pieces established.

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DRRD

Hard, but interesting, read.

Reviewed in the United States on March 2, 2014

Verified Purchase

As some others have already mentioned, this is a hard book to get into. First thing for a new reader to do is read the Glossary at the back. There's so many local/English phrases used that it's hard to figure out what's going on. It really makes it a struggle to get through the story without knowing a lot of them.

And so the characters don't really start kicking in until the ninth chapter or so. Until then, it's like reading through chaos. There's stuff going on, but unless you've picked out character names before and know who to pay attention to, it's hard to follow or care about any of them as they're going through the action the reader is dropped into. It's later, as their personalities start to emerge that I felt I cared about what was happening to them, even when I couldn't figure it out.

A lot of the action in the book is subjective to the character who's POV you see it from. They don't know what they're messing with, they don't know what's going on or why, what its history is or anything. They're flying blind without having anything to use as a reference. So what they see, hear and experience doesn't really make a lot of sense at times, to me or to the characters. And there's a sense of them being too closed off from each other. Such as Quill's wife calling him "Quill" even in private. Who calls their spouse by the last name? They feel one dimensional enough that it's strange to see that they actually have first names. Sometimes there's a lot of mystery, and no real answers to the questions posed. We don't know what to expect or how the Magic works because the characters don't know or understand. And when they were given answers, it was more in the form of more questions, which can be very annoying.

Yet I did finally get into the story and the characters enough to enjoy the it and be curious to see how it turned out. After hanging on and working through it I found I was glad I stuck with it. There was enough I could 'get' to keep it all tied together. And I finally started to care about the characters toward the end, when we finally got to see more of them than what was needed for the job. And to see what their choices to very hard, and ugly, situations were.

I'm debating about the next in the series, due out in a few months. I'm hoping the author has a better handle on the characters and won't have so much trouble making them and their actions clear. And as they learn about the Magic in this universe, hopefully so will we, and it'll be easier to follow along.

I guess my interest will depend on more reviews. I'm not sure this universe is worth another really tough slog through it.

4 people found this helpful

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Travis Good

Well-written, but a big catch

Reviewed in Canada on July 18, 2021

Verified Purchase

If you enjoy this series, note that the author has all-but said that he doesn’t know when he’s going to continue it. So it’s possible, like I did, to get 3 books in and not have any closure regarding the main story arc. I think it’s a shame that this is the case, but this is a warning to all potential readers so you don’t end up wasting your time.

Chiara Elissa Torres Bayley

London Falling is gripping

Reviewed in Spain on March 21, 2018

Verified Purchase

If you like the strange, the impossible and things that go bump in the dark then you have found a wonderful book. Not your average detective, good vs crooked cop novel. Suberbly written I found it gripping and the author caught me off guard quite a bit. Loved it!

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Mel

London Falling

Reviewed in Australia on June 12, 2022

Verified Purchase

Gripping, heady ride all the way! Clever and captivating. The everyday merges with its supernatural underbelly, in contemporary London policing. Characters complex.

One person found this helpful

Ringi

Spannende Polizei-Horror, aber nicht für jedermann.

Reviewed in Germany on December 21, 2014

Verified Purchase

Nachdem ich die PC Grant Bücher von Aaronovitch durch hatte, war ich auf der Suche nach weitere Urban Fantasy und bin auf London Falling gestoßen. Auch wenn das Grundthema der Polizisten, die in einer Art Parallel Welt von London ermitteln sehr ähnlich ist, könnten die Bücher kaum unterschiedlicher sein. Während bei Aaronovitch eine aufregende Fantasy-Welt gezeichnet wird, in der Peter Grant mit einer Portion Sarkasmus ermittelt, werden in London Falling die 4 Protagonisten in eine Welt aus den dunkelsten Albträumen gestoßen, die sie immer tiefer in den Schrecken hinein zieht. Für mich fällt London Falling definitv unter Horror.
Wer sich auf die teuflische Geschichte einlässt, sieht zu, wie die 4 Polizisten in dieser neuen Welt herum irren und versuchen ohne die sonst üblichen allwissenden Leitpersonen (Dombledort, Nightingale, Gandalf) in detektivischer Kleinarbeit und etlichen lebensbedrohenden Trial-and-Error die Welt zu verstehen und zu besiegen.
Alles in allen ein spannendes Buch, dessen Ende noch viele weitere Bände verspricht. Wer gerne über die dunkleren Seiten der Fantasy lesen will, ist hier genau richtig.

Die Sprache ist etwas schwieriger als in anderen Büchern dieses Genres. Ich musste mehrmals zurück gehen und Absätze nochmals lesen, um sie zu verstehen.

13 people found this helpful

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Glenn Lindsey

Oh, what a witch!

Reviewed in Canada on May 22, 2020

Verified Purchase

Urban fantasy or murder mystery? How about both? It gets disturbing but you can't put the book down. Blood, chills and screams. Did I mention a talking cat? A very entertaining tale.

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London Falling (The Shadow Police, 1) Mass Market Paperback – February 25, 2014

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