★★★★★ Mhari and the New Management

The Labyrinth Index

Charles Stross, Bianca Amato (narrator)

Book 8 of Charles Stross's Laundry Files, The Delirium Brief, ended with The senior auditor making an almost literal deal with the devil. Not the Christian Adversary Satan, but a different devil, the Black Pharaoh, N’yar Lat-Hotep. The SA judged that the Black Pharaoh was a lesser evil than the Sleeper in the Pyramid (who may be Cthulhu -- I'm a bit confused about that). The Black Pharaoh defeated the Sleeper in England and is now Prime Minister of the UK.

This world, in which the Black Pharaoh rules the United Kingdom, is the setting of Stross's New Management series, which he regards as a new and separate series from the Laundry Files. And it is! Except for occasional cameos by Laundry Files characters, the characters and plots of the New Management are quite separate from the Laundry Files.

The Labyrinth Index is a kind of hybrid, in that it takes place in the UK of the New Management but is peopled by Laundry Files characters and continues the Laundry Files story.

In The Labyrinth Index the Prime Minister sends Mhari Murphy to the USA on a secret mission to thwart his old adversary Cthulhu, who is making inroads there. Mhari takes along a crew of familiar folks: Brains, Pete the Vcar, Janice, Derek the Dungeon-Master, and Jim Gray (AKA officer Friendly). Also, one new character: an alfar magus Yarisol’mün, who also calls herself Jon.

Jon/Yarisol is a wonderful new character. She is the only female among the alfar magi. She's neurodivergent -- on the Autism spectrum, and she brings extraordinary focus and ability to her sorcery. She's also very funny.

I read The Labyrinth Index on kindle in 2017 and I was less than fully enchanted, mainly because I didn't like Mhari. But over the last few weeks, I listened to the audiobook, narrated by Bianca Amato, and Amato's performance helped me to understand Mhari better. Mhari works at being unlikeable. She's a vampire, manipulative and power-hungry -- at least, that's how she sees herself and wants to be seen. She refers to her lover with a word I can't use in an Amazon review. She hides behind acid cynicism. But she's good at what she does, and what she does is good, or at least the lesser evil.

The Labyrinth Index is the last published book in the Laundry Files, as of 8-Mar-2024. A novela A Conventional Boy about Derek the Dungeon-Master Stross is expected soon -- on his blog, Stross describes it as 'the one that's already written and delivered to the Production people who turn it into a thing you'll be able to buy later this year—is a Laundry stand-alone titled "A Conventional Boy".' He has also promised a final novel to wrap up the Laundry Files. We get some hints to the likely contents of that future book in the form of remarks about "Extended Continuity Operations" in this one. I won't spoil them, and indeed, it would make little difference if I did, because they are so vague.

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