I have waxed lyrical about this series before. To see that, unexpectedly, Connolly was about to drop another 2 installments this year before finishing it up with a final novel next year-ish was very welcome news.
Connolly epitomises the struggle of small to mid-list authors these days. They just can't get any traction, sales wise. This series (not so much the fantasy he turned to in a fit of almost pique after the sales of the first three novels just weren't there) should have been a shoo in for decent sales. Critically acclaimed, universally rated highly by those of us who have read the books, it's sales should grow. That they don't is a great shame.
I punched this out in 2 days as a palate cleanser after some hefty re-reads. My previous views of this series stand. The set-up is nicely skewed from the urban fantasy norm, the characters different if a touch bleak and the actual menace is usually brought by stupid and venal people. As opposed to magical beings fulfilling their one-dimensional nature.
For this book he goes all closed house mystery with a perspective from both inside and outside using his 2 main protagonists. This allows for a really good level of development of said protagonists that maybe had been a little lacking in the series to date.
A firm recommend from me.