Brass Man

The third Agent Cormac novel is a good read, though not a great one. The plot carries on from the earlier two books with pursuit of both Dragon and Skellor, although it seems to be quite a lot later (the characters are essentially immortal, after all). There's a significant focus on Mr Crane, much of it told in flashback to explain his origins and how he came to be the way he is. (Given the title and the picture on the cover, I'm not considering it a spoiler to say that he is in the book, despite having died back in the first one).

On the whole it works well enough, and its peppered with Asher's trademark monstrous and deadly wildlife - in this case, what appear to be giant arthropods. It wraps up a lot of storylines, while still leaving a few open. One does wonder, though, whether the insights into Polity culture at the beginning of each chapter are meant to be satirical or not. Hard to tell, although one hopes its the former.