The Dresden Files/Changes

Book #12 in The Dresden Files.

Long ago, Susan Rodriguez was Harry Dresden's lover-until she was attacked by his enemies, leaving her torn between her own humanity and the bloodlust of the vampiric Red Court. Susan then disappeared to South America, where she could fight both her savage gift and those who cursed her with it.

Now Arianna Ortega, Duchess of the Red Court, has discovered a secret Susan has long kept, and she plans to use it-against Harry. To prevail this time, he may have no choice but to embrace the raging fury of his own untapped dark power. Because Harry's not fighting to save the world...

He's fighting to save his child.

Tropes associated with Changes:
"Sufficiently advanced technology, I suppose."
 * Always a Bigger Fish: Red Court vampire assassins and some kind of giant demon called an Ik'K'Kuox (Referred to as a "devourer") were on Harry's heels. To get away from them, he made a portal to the Nevernever... which
 * Back-to-Back Badasses: Sanya and . Harry and DJ Molly C, too.
 * Badass Abnormal: Murphy temporarily takes up one of the Swords. And the possibility of a permanent position is even more open than it was before...]] She defies the trope, though; there are job offers for a position of a, but she isn't enthusiastic about it.
 * Bittersweet Ending
 * Book Ends: Harry tells Martin at the beginning, "I have literally killed people I like better than you."
 * Break the Haughty: Arianna is reduced from Smug Snake to stammering wreck after Harry defeats her and sends her plans crashing into ruin.
 * The Cavalry:.
 * Cavalry Betrayal:  manages to pull this off.
 * Chekhov's Gun: Jim Butcher is really good at inverting the Gun with important things that are only noticeable by their absence. For example, that gap between  and when he  ? Something very important happens during that gap in the narration.
 * The Chessmaster: Multiple, including Lara Raith and.
 * Clarke's Third Law: Harry enters the corporate headquarters of Monoc Securities and sees a pair of receptionists working at two computers whose monitors were composed of very fine mist that floated in the air as if a whispy illusion.

"PS-Why, yes, I can in fact capitalize any words I desire. The language is English. I am English. Therefore mine is the opinion which matters, colonial heathen."
 * Cliff Hanger:
 * Combat by Champion
 * Cultural Posturing:
 * Cultural Posturing:

"Harry: Go Go Gadget Faustian Bargain!"
 * Ironic, considering the fact that as an Englishman, it should be "capitalise".
 * Deal with the Devil: The Knights of the Blackened Denarius play host to demons (fallen angels) in exchange for power, knowledge, and immortality. They have to willingly touch a cursed coin and let the Fallen in.
 * Harry made a deal with . In fact, if she had turned him down, his next stop would have been

"Harry:"
 * Deconstruction: As one would expect from the sheer GRIMDARK. Changes and Ghost Story seem to have taken it upon themselves to deconstruct as many of Harry's exploits as possible, with Harry's rap sheet catching up to him.
 * Disappeared Dad:
 * Evil Power Vacuum: Harry . Aftermath reveals that there are already creatures looking to take advantage of the fallout.
 * Eye Scream:
 * Gambit Pileup: The events in Changes have several gambits slamming into one another. Both the Red King and Arianna are plotting against one another, with Arianna kidnapping  and the Red King  . Then it slams into   and to  . At the same time, there's , and a strong indication that at least one archangel is throwing in on the whole affair when  . And topping it all is the gambit set up by  , except that said gambit was  . If your head is hurting trying to figure the whole thing out, then Butcher was successful.
 * Genre Savvy: The team Harry assembles to  spend a few moments trying to figure out which member of the Fellowship they are. This also turns out to be Foreshadowing, if you pay attention.
 * Guilt Complex: After
 * Guilt-Free Extermination War: The war between the Red Court of vampires and the White Council.
 * Heroic BSOD: After
 * Heroic Fire Rescue: . He has a severe case of Chronic Hero Syndrome after all.
 * Heroic Sacrifice: Martin orchestrated this this when he
 * Hoist by His Own Petard: The Red Court, after
 * Hollywood Silencer: Averted. A crowd fails to realize someone just tried to kill Dresden, but then the characters discuss just why it worked (subsonic ammo, the shooter fired from inside a vehicle to hide the barrel and muffle the sound, etc.)
 * Hope Spot: It briefly seems like the group . Harry wins the battle, but
 * Human Sacrifice: Used more than once. The plot is saving before she can be sacrificed. Harry.
 * I Did What I Had to Do:

"Lea: Honestly, child, there are elements other than fire, you know."
 * Kill It with Fire: Harry's combat choice du jour. Pointed out by Lea:

"Do not meddle in the affairs of wizards, for they are subtle and quick to anger. Tolkien had that one mostly right."
 * Arianna actually specifically prepares for fire by using water spells. Unfortunately for her, Harry had recently added ice to his repertoire.
 * Locked Into Strangeness: Lea.
 * Long-Lost Relative:
 * Luke, I Am Your Father: It is revealed
 * Magical Defibrillator: Immediately after, Harry's heart stops, and his friends attempt to revive him with a defibrillator. Because of magic, Harry was never in any danger, so the trope is technically averted. It's played straight in spirit, though, as Butters says using the defibrillator was "what any good mortician would do."
 * Mama Bear:
 * Memory Gambit:  pulled this in Changes, although it's not revealed to the reader until Ghost Story.
 * Now You Tell Me: In the opening chapters of Changes,  The maintenance crew also came a while previously to "remove asbestos." Take a guess how that one turned out.
 * Oh Crap: The tagline for Changes can pretty much be summed up as this, considering the number of times Harry actually thinks or says it.
 * Pre-Ass-Kicking One-Liner: "Fuck subtle." The context?

": Bow. Down. Mortal. Harry: Bite. Me. Asshole."
 * Punctuated for Emphasis :


 * Rabid Cop: Attempted by Rudolph as a technique to use on Harry. It failed epically, and only resulted in Harry laughing his arse off because of how hard Rudolph failed.
 * Roaring Rampage of Rescue: Basically Changes is entirely this.
 * Shoot the Dog: Changes.
 * Shoulders of Doom: "This is ridiculous. I look like the Games Workshop version of a Jedi Knight."
 * Spanner in the Works: Harry is able to find out that Maggie is in Mexico because the minions in charge of shipping the ritual gear got careless and forgot to send everything. As such they had to send another shipment and keep the records for a checkup; As such Harry was thus able to find the records for the second shipment and narrow it down, which ultimately contributed to his reaching Maggie in time to stop the sacrifice.
 * Stealth Pun / Visual Pun: Harry sees pretty much the entire Red Court standing on a ziggurat, with higher ranking vampires on each level. After a bit of explanation on how their promotion system works and how they trick mortals into thinking they are gods, the reader realizes he is being shown a Pyramid Scheme.
 * Trauma Conga Line: Harry learns he has a daughter and that she has been kidnapped by the Red Court. Within the first four chapters, Harry's  gets blown up. In the rest of the book,.
 * Trial by Combat: When Harry and Susan are pursued by the Eebs and their vampire hit-squad into the Nevernever, they end up in  Due to competing claims by Harry and the Eebs   challenges them to a trial by combat to determine who is right.   Also,   in an example of this trope   Because both have equally legitimate claims for collecting blood debts the Red King opts to do the option that will potentially allow both to try to settle their claim.
 * Unholy Nuke: The Bloodline ritual, which takes out everyone related to a sacrificial victim. Harry uses it to take out the entire Red Court.
 * Watching Troy Burn: In Changes, both Harry's office and apartment are destroyed by Red Court terrorists. In both cases, the vampires used incendiary explosives from a distance, leaving Harry nothing to do but rescue the inhabitants in the buildings and watch them turn to ash.
 * Wham! Episode: Changes. Let's just say it lives up to its name.
 * Wham! Line: The first line of Changes is.
 * What You Are in the Dark: Harry has moments like these in the series, but it is most exemplified here, where several characters tell Harry that the current crisis will "show him who he really is."
 * Yank the Dog's Chain: At the end of Changes, it is strongly implied that Murphy and Harry were finally going to resolve their UST, and then we get the ending. In the same book, Lea hints that she, and by extension other Sidhe, could remove the vampirism from Susan Rodriguez and other half-turned people. This gives Harry some hope that she could be cured. In the end,