Book Review: Billibub Baddings and The Case of The Singing Sword

Billibub Baddings and The Case of The Singing Sword Amazon US PB Amazon Canada PB
Tee Morris
Class/Genre: Fantasy Mystery Private Investigator
2004, Dragon Moon Press, 264 pp.

“In using magic, a chain of events is set into motion, and if you’re not careful you will quickly lose control of those events And at that moment you’re truly screwed.” So says Billibub Baddings, four-foot one with a forty-something inch waist, long red beard and braided hair dressed in a custom made pin stripe suit and doing business as a Private Eye during prohibition times in the City of Chicago, year 1929. Strange? Not as strange as the events in this book.

Billibub fell through an open portal in his realm of Acryonis during The Great War of The Races where Billi was a Captain of the 25th Dwarf Warriors Company whose motto was “Don’t Let’em Know You’re Coming, but Let Them Know When You’re Leaving.” Billi was attempting to toss magic talismans into the portal and somehow Billi was sucked through. For Billi The Portal of Oblivion wound up being the Chicago Public Library.

Billi used the vast amount of information he found in the library to educate himself on his new environment and eventually was able to leave the library and establish a business for himself as a Private Eye along with a beautiful, intelligent secretary that knew nothing of his previous life.

One day a beautiful woman appeared in his office and paid big money up front to hire Billy to investigate the death of her boy friend Anthony “Pretty Boy” DeMayo who had been cut down in the prime of life by the Capone mob or so the rumors went. Billi’s new client Julia Lesinger was the youngest daughter of one of Chicago’s leading families and the fee went a long way toward taking care of Billi’s expenses for a few months so he had no choice but to accept the case.

Billi began his investigation, which lead him to speakeasies, meeting Capone’s henchmen and into various other dangers. It became obvious that the mob leaders of Chicago were after a treasure found on a dig in Egypt. Billi knew this treasure to be The Singing Sword; one of the talismans that he had thrown threw the open portal back in his own realm.

I won’t tell you how much power The Singing Sword possessed or who was able to control that power. You will have to read the book to find this out as well as how life was lived in 1929. You will discover what is like for a dwarf to break bread with the famous Al Capone.

Billi has a knack for making you laugh. A decent mystery, a peak at life in another realm and a little bit of history all combined in one little book. A nice change of pace read.

Reprinted with permission. Do Not repost without permission from the author, Pat Reid - RAM

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