Readers of my reviews and blog know I love Lumsden’s noir modern alt-history fantasy world.

A new adventure for Shade the Collector and his buddy Dwayne. This time a river spirit entrusts him with a coprolite (petrified excrement) to hide and guard. Naturally, the shadowy intelligence agency that employs him on occasion immediately gets him to find a matching piece — or else.

When follows is a small-town adventure, where nothing is quite what is seems on the surface a...