Simon R. Green’s The Man With The Golden Torc is a light, frothy, occasionally bawdy, extremely violent little cross between James Bond, wacky conspiracy theory, and urban fantasy. It’s the espionage counterpart of Jim Butcher’s Harry Dresden novels, except that it’s considerably more farcical.

The eponymous Man With The Golden Torc is one Edwin Drood, of the infamous Drood family. You’ve never heard of the Droods (not these Droods, pace Charles Dickens) because they work behind the scenes to keep humanity safe from Things Man Was Not Meant To Know. (One gathers that just about every third person on the street is a Thing Man Was Not Meant To Know; we’re definitely in Men In Black territory.) At least, that’s what Eddie has been raised to believe.

The Droods are each equipped with a golden torc with many strange powers. Using it, a Drood can walk unseen; and in addition, a Drood can call up golden armor that will protect him from nigh well any attack you can imagine. Of course, unimaginable horrors are a dime-a-dozen in Eddie’s world….

I read the book on my Kindle while on vacation, on a whim, and for vacation reading it was good fun. Light, frothy, not at all deep or serious—it’s not a book for the ages. If you like Harry Dresden, give it a try.

I liked it well enough to buy the first two sequels, both of which have Bond-derived titles. Are you ready for this? Daemons Are Forever (I kid you not) and The Spy Who Haunted Me. Daemons Are Forever has the better title, and some good bits, but it’s weaker than the other two; The Spy Who Haunted Me has a lousy title but was a lot of fun.