#158 in Science fiction
The Delirium Brief
- 384
- Pages
- about 7 h
- Reading time
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Our view
“The Delirium Brief” is a sharp Laundry Files novel in which the secret agency, now exposed to the public, has to fight for its survival. Bob Howard is back as narrator, and Charles Stross mines the premise for political comedy about the civil service and its alternatives. Some readers praise how fresh the series still feels, with rising stakes and a distinct cast. It suits fans of this blend of horror and office politics.
The view of the BookRank editors, written from readers’ ratings and comments. It does not affect the score or the book’s place in a ranking.
About the book
Someone is dead set to air the spy agency's dirty laundry in The Delirium Brief , the next installment to Charles Stross' Hugo Award-winning comedic dark fantasy Laundry Files series! Bob Howard's career in the Laundry, the secret British government agency dedicated to protecting the world from unspeakable horrors from beyond spacetime, has entailed high combat, brilliant hacking, ancient magic, and combat with indescribably repellent creatures of pure evil. It has also involved a wearying amount of paperwork and office politics, and his expense reports are still a mess. Now, following the invasion of Yorkshire by the Host of Air and Darkness, the Laundry's existence has become public, and Bob is being trotted out on TV to answer pointed questions about elven asylum seekers. What neither Bob nor his managers have foreseen is that their organization has earned the attention of a horror far more terrifying than any demon: a British government looking for public services to privatize. Inch by inch, Bob Howard and his managers are forced to consider the truly unthinkable: a coup against the British government itself.
Reading order · The Laundry Files
Full order & progress →- The Atrocity ArchivesStart here
7.67.6 / 10 - The Jennifer Morgue
7.87.8 / 10 - The Fuller Memorandum
8.08.0 / 10 - The Apocalypse Codex
8.08.0 / 10 - The Rhesus Chart
7.97.9 / 10 - The Annihilation Score
7.87.8 / 10 - The Nightmare Stacks
7.87.8 / 10 - The Delirium BriefThis book
8.18.1 / 10 - The Labyrinth Index
7.97.9 / 10 - Dead Lies Dreaming
7.97.9 / 10 - Quantum of Nightmares
–Not ranked yet - Season of Skulls
–Not ranked yet - A Conventional BoyA Conventional Boy–Not ranked yet
Where the score comes from
The sources average 8.3 across 102 ratings — not yet many, so the reader vote carries 41% of the weight and the rest pulls toward the Science fiction average of 7.8. That is how 8.1 comes out.
| Source | Average | Ratings | Weight |
|---|---|---|---|
| Hardcover | 8.3 | 102 | 100% |
Frequently asked
How long is The Delirium Brief?
It has 384 pages — shorter than 82% of the ranked books in Science fiction.
In this book
Themes this book shares with others — each leads to the best books on it.
If you liked this
Same shelf — Science fiction — with scores between 8.0 and 8.2, closest to this book.
