You can't keep a good wizard down — even when he wants to stay that way.

For years, Harry Dresden has been Chicago's only professional wizard, but a bargain made in desperation with the Queen of Air and Darkness has forced him into a new job: professional killer. Mab, the mother of wicked faeries, has restored the mostly-dead wizard to health, and dispatches him upon his first mission — to bring death to an immortal.

Even as he grapples with the impossible task, Dresden learns of a looming danger to Demonreach, the living island hidden upon Lake Michigan, a place whose true purpose and dark potential have the potential to destroy billions and to land Dresden in the deepest trouble he has ever known — even deeper than being dead. How messed up is that?

Beset by his new enemies and hounded by the old, Dresden has only twenty-four hours to reconnect with his old allies, prevent a cataclysm, and do the impossible — all while the power he bargained to get — but never meant to keep — lays siege to his very soul.

Magic. It can get a guy killed.