Equoid: a Laundry Novella (Laundry Files)

Endless paperwork is usually the worst part of any modern office job, but for Bob Howard, it’s undoubtedly the safest, since any fieldwork usually ends with him scrambling to save the Earth from monstrous unknowable Lovecraftian horrors. So naturally, he’s hoping his latest assignment – assisting with an inspection of a local farm – will be boring drudgery rather than supernatural combat. But there’s something horrific lurking in the stables of Edgebaston Farm, and before his trip is over, Bob will find himself wondering how anyone ever thought unicorns were sweet and pretty.

A curious mix of diary, procedural parody, and supernatural investigation, Equoid is an odd duck, as odd as the unicorns trotting along the edges of the story. Simultaneously jam-packed with Stross’s unnerving, gloriously weird details and a bit thin on the actual narrative thrust, Equoid feels less like a novella and more like a short story with grand ambitions.

But the combination of magic, myth, and the trappings of police-investigation stories works well here, imbuing the novella with a narrative urgency that the characters themselves seem to lack. (But perhaps that’s a consequence of the small-town setting, as Bob usually prowls more urban environments while battling evil.)