Picked my copy up and read it last night.
I have to admit that I missed the call on the shooter.
[spoiler]My money was on Fix, who had ample reason for a preemptive strike and shown inclinations that way before. As Summer Knight, I imagine that he could make the shot from sufficient range to pull it off.
I figured that Kincaid would have gone for a headshot…and I still wonder why he didn’t. He’s more than capable of it; this is, after all, a guy who lined up a double headshot on a pair of the Fallen while hanging from ropes. Is it possible that he expected someone to try to revive Harry, and wanted to leave the option open? A headshot would have been a bit much even for Mab and Demonreach to overcome.
I also did not suspect that Harry had ordered the hit himself.[/spoiler]
My assessment of the motivation was correct, but that was fairly obvious. Harry’s
revival was also pretty much exactly as I envisioned, right down to the, er, “intra-vine-ous” nutrition.
Like Uosdwis R. Dewoh, I love the fact that
Mort got the Big Damn Hero moment. A whole army shows up to save him, and he ends up saving the day. In fact, I was impressed with Mort throughout. We’ve only been shown glimpses of his growth before, but he has now graduated from swindling lowlife to full-fledged badass. (Even if he does still consider himself a coward.)
Xan,
[spoiler]I’m actually a bit worried about Bob. When last seen, he was tangling with his Evil Twin/Bastard Child/Goateed Skull. His stated intention was to close the Way and flee, but was he able to get away? Evil Bob only represents about, what, a quarter of Bob’s “life”…but that quarter is loaded with purely destructive knowledge and power. If Bob wasn’t able to ditch him, could he have won the fight?
If so, what might he have had to do? As he pointed out, once he was out of Harry’s possession, Harry’s orders were no longer binding. He was no longer compelled not to remember his time with Kemmler; he just couldn’t, because he had excised the memories that became Evil Bob. What if he had to reabsorb them, like the ghosts reabsorbing their memories, to win? Suddenly, he has the potential to go Dark Side again.
Alternatively, if Bob got away, Evil Bob is still out there. That can’t be a good thing for the good guys.[/spoiler]