87. (March 2020) Rivers of London by Ben Aaronovitch — The Tabletop Roleplayers' Book Club https://www.ttrpbc.krilov.com/ Sun, 31 May 2026 18:00:22 +0000 en 87. (March 2020) Rivers of London by Ben Aaronovitch — The Tabletop Roleplayers' Book Club 7. Gaming https://www.ttrpbc.krilov.com/discussion/422/7-gaming Thu, 02 Apr 2020 07:52:34 +0000 87. (March 2020) Rivers of London by Ben Aaronovitch RichardAbbott 422@/discussions How might you build this setting into a game? Obviously there's a special invitation to @dr_mitch to elaborate on his thoughts about this, but others might have different views to complement his.

Which elements from the book would you include and which would you drop? Would you focus more on magical combat? Investigations into mystery? Crime with magical elements? Negotiations between supernatural beings?

]]> 4. The Narrative Form https://www.ttrpbc.krilov.com/discussion/419/4-the-narrative-form Thu, 02 Apr 2020 07:49:43 +0000 87. (March 2020) Rivers of London by Ben Aaronovitch RichardAbbott 419@/discussions The book is essentially a police procedural, albeit with supernatural elements. Did you find it convincing as such? Did the book engage you at an intellectual level, emotional, or both? Or indeed, just pass you by without engaging you?

]]> 6. The Writing Style https://www.ttrpbc.krilov.com/discussion/421/6-the-writing-style Thu, 02 Apr 2020 07:51:40 +0000 87. (March 2020) Rivers of London by Ben Aaronovitch RichardAbbott 421@/discussions The book uses a first-person perspective, and also deploys a number of other strategies to get you to accept that Peter Grant is a real person who you might have already met at the pub or supermarket. For example, there is the frequent use of well-known fictional books and films to establish familiar links - in a fairly short section I spotted the X-Files, Star Wars and the Godfather, and there are many others. Peter is basically saying, "look, I'm your mate and we have probably watched the same Netflix series".

Did this work for you? Did he seem a believable next-door neighbour?

]]> 5. The Rivers and Tributaries https://www.ttrpbc.krilov.com/discussion/420/5-the-rivers-and-tributaries Thu, 02 Apr 2020 07:50:52 +0000 87. (March 2020) Rivers of London by Ben Aaronovitch RichardAbbott 420@/discussions A lot is made of the various personified tributaries of the Thames, split male and female at Teddington lock, where (as you head downstream) the river becomes tidal. Did you find these Orisa figures interesting? Credible? Important to the plot? There is a kind of two-way flow of appearance and character between the tributaries and the current human population of the area concerned. Did this work for you? In passing, CS Lewis calls his planetary tutelary spirits Oyarsa in his science fiction trilogy - an odd coincidence, though Lewis derived his word from Medieval Latin/European sources and Ben Aaronovitch from Nigerian.

For those wanting a bit more information, you could do worse than check out the following: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tributaries_of_the_River_Thames, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Subterranean_rivers_of_London or https://londonist.com/2014/08/how-londons-rivers-got-their-names

]]> 3. The Characters https://www.ttrpbc.krilov.com/discussion/418/3-the-characters Thu, 02 Apr 2020 07:49:04 +0000 87. (March 2020) Rivers of London by Ben Aaronovitch RichardAbbott 418@/discussions What did you make of the main human characters - Peter Grant, Lesley May, Thomas Nightingale, Alexander Seawolf etc? Did you find them engaging and/or credible? (In passing, I thought Toby was the best-drawn small dog I have met in a book for a very long time)

]]> 2. The Plot(s) https://www.ttrpbc.krilov.com/discussion/417/2-the-plot-s Thu, 02 Apr 2020 07:48:26 +0000 87. (March 2020) Rivers of London by Ben Aaronovitch RichardAbbott 417@/discussions There were multiple plot threads running simultaneously - for example the murders based on the tale of Punch, plus the turf war between Father and Mother Thames, plus the development of Peter Grant's own magical prowess. Was this too much? Or did the various plot arcs dovetail sufficiently well for you?

]]> 1. The Setting https://www.ttrpbc.krilov.com/discussion/416/1-the-setting Thu, 02 Apr 2020 07:47:46 +0000 87. (March 2020) Rivers of London by Ben Aaronovitch RichardAbbott 416@/discussions Did the contemporary London setting work for you? Do you feel it needed too detailed  a knowledge of London streets and regions? How about the pervasive integration of the supernatural sphere into the real world, with most London citizens unaware of this?

]]> Other inspiration: London Falling, by Paul Cornell https://www.ttrpbc.krilov.com/discussion/423/other-inspiration-london-falling-by-paul-cornell Fri, 03 Apr 2020 07:55:37 +0000 87. (March 2020) Rivers of London by Ben Aaronovitch NeilNjae 423@/discussions I stumbled across the book London Falling by Paul Cornell. It's very similar to Rivers of London: urban fantasy, police procedural, set in modern London, magic based on sense of place, magical world hidden from the mundanes, etc. But the tone is different. Where Rivers of London is a relatively optimistic book, London Falling has a distinct bend towards horror.

It's pretty good. It starts with a purely mundane police operation to take down a drug lord, and takes a bit too long to get to the supernatural side which is when things get going. The author switches viewpoint character rapidly, which can be a bit confusing especially as some of the characters aren't that strongly drawn.

I picked up the first book when it was on offer on Amazon, but sadly that's passed. It's the first book in a trilogy, and I'll pick up the other books at some point.

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