“He thinks he’s a wizard,” they said.

For five grand a month and a million-dollar chaser, Roger Mulligan didn’t care how crazy the old geezer was. All he had to do was keep Joseph Perry Shackleford alive and keep him from squandering the estate for a year.

But they didn’t tell him about the pixies.

In theory, I shouldn’t have enjoyed this book. It moved slowly, there was very little action and there were lots of detailed descriptions of the daily duties a butler performs to keep a very old, very wealthy man comfortable in his enormous house. At best, I should have been bored. At worst I should have been alienated by a life lived to reinforce the privileges enjoyed by the wealthy. 

The practical reality was nothing like the theory. I thoroughly enjoyed this book. I found it soothing. I liked the people. I welcomed being given the time fully to understand the new life that Roger Mulligan, ex-soldier with three tours in Afghanistan, ex-EMT who lost his job and gained a criminal record when he beat up the abusive husband of a woman he’d been called to treat, has decided to embrace. 

I was charmed by Mulligan’s reaction to becoming a butler. It was a job he took because he needed the money but which he then fell in love with. 

Mulligan wasn’t really hired to be a butler. Mulligan was hired by the scheming niece of the wealthy old man because his medical training meant he could keep the old man alive for the twelve months it was likely to take for her to arrange to have her uncle declared incompetent and have him shipped off to a nursing home.

The job stopped being about the money when he got to know the old man, Joe Shackleford, and as he started to fall under the spell of the atmosphere of Shackleford House. Mulligan has a steep learning curve to climb to become a butler, even before he learns about the pixies who live in Shackleford House and about Shacklefored’s unusual abilities. A big part of the appeal of the book was that Mulligan enjoys the climb. After decades in high adrenalin jobs, he welcomes the quiet rhythms of his job and the sense of achievement that comes from acquiring new skills. For Mulligan, becoming a butler is a balm to his troubled soul. 

Then there’s the magic, which is low-key but fun. 

And the plot around helping Shackleford deal with a curse that’s stealing his mind a little bit at a time.

And most fun of all: trying to frustrate the plans of the obnoxious niece to have Shackleford declared incompetent.

Mulligan rises to the challenges with a calm competence that gives him back his dignity and his sense of purpose. 

My enjoyment of the book was greatly increased by Tom Taylorson’s narration. I can see why ‘The Wizard’s Butler’ won the 2021 Voice Arts Award, Audiobook Narration — Fantasy. Taylorson brings the dialogue to life and gives the main characters recognisable and appropriate voices.