Let me give you some back ground to this question. I have a very eclectic taste in books. In no particular order my top five is Watership down, K is for killer, Pride and prejudice, 1984 and one for the money. For the longest time Butcher and Evanovich were my top authors. Until her last book. I was so mad at her choice of husband ( straight married white guy that likes rom coms here ) that I may never read another of her books EVER AGAIN. Which got me to thinking. What would have to happen for mus to not read another Butcher book? Thoughts?

Already kind of happened: Murphy's death and the treatment of her and Thomas', and just the whole Peace Talks/Battle Ground trying so hard to replicate MCU's End Game vibes. That, already killed 95% of my interest in the series. I'm going to stick around for Twelve Months, with that 5% of hope, but if I see any hint of Harry/Lara actually becoming a real thing, or Malcolm Dresden not being "just a very good man", I'm out, probably.

Yes, but if the books continue to reflect real time, and Jim is averaging one every three to five years, Harry would be 43 to 45 the next book, still considered quite young by wizard standards, but menopausal 48 year old Murphy is in middle age, and the next one would put her over 50, by the time of the BAT she would have been on Social Security had she lived, while Harry was just reaching his prime.  What makes me sad is how she died, better she had died from her hand to hand with Nic than a bullet through the neck from a panicked cop.

The books have not been reflecting real time in a while. There's just 5 months between Skin Game and Peace Talks, hours between Peace Talks and Battle Ground. And we already know that the next book will cover the year of his engagement to Lara, which puts the start and finish of it within one year right after Battle Ground. There won't be a leap in years to the next book that would reflect our real time or publication time, nor do we know what Jim will continue to do in that regard in the future, yet.

I'm not arguing over what's prime age or whatever, just pointing out what the facts are regarding the ages of the characters in-universe. Not interested in making assumptions here.

According to a fan who attended Comicpalooza this past weekend, Jim said he's planning to turn the book to the editors by July 1st.

In theory, that could give us a release by the end of the year.

I don't trust him to keep that schedule, personally, but let's hope.

That did backfire on her with the swords, however, since she had been "contaminated" in her faith by hanging out with Odin's people and therefor she did waver in her convictions. Or that's how I interpreted it, I could be quite off here.

That's an interesting take, I personally don't agree about her being "contaminated" in her faith, actually she shows multiple times to try to still hold some faith in her god, she even crosses herself in Battle Ground, something which most Catholics don't just do because, it's a testament of where your faith lies. I honestly think that she just made a mistake, she was scared for Harry, she was angry, that's all that happened. And it was ultimately to serve another purpose, for the right person to have the sword, Butters. (which is not who I'd pick but *shrug*). But it all served a purpose.

And it probably extends to Battle Ground, she had to touch bottom by the time of her death, because obviously she had to die in Battle Ground, I think the fact that Sanya and Butters just happened to arrive that night at Macs, where she was, stay and get "convinced" to take her to Harry that night, is testament enough that the White God, was involved in her death. The knights are always where they are supposed to be.

Let's face it. Murphy is going to return as a Valkyrie.

But, Murphy doesn't fit the physical model of a Valkyrie, you say. We don't know for certain how Valkyries are created in the Dresdenverse.

One-eye has Soulfire. It makes things real. It's how he rejoins the Einherjar's spirits to their bodies. (WOJ, Dresden Files podcast, December, 2020) Soulfire makes things real.

So, Odin makes a Valkyrie statuesque body from clay (plenty of examples from various myths), uses Soulfire to make it real, then uses Soulfire again to fuse Murphy's soul with the new body. Bob's your spirit in a skull, new Valkyrie.

This would also give Jim fertile ground to give a couple of appearances of the "new character" that we could go back after the reveal and say "Oh, Jim. You absolute bastard! You were torturing Murphy and Harry didn't know!"

Which is the most Jim-catnip thing, ever. And that's why he will do it.

Oh, that's just so cruel, it's a great idea. But personally, I like cute, blonde, 5 feet nothing Murph with her pert little nose, though.

But also, Odin took her body. She's not buried underground, her corpse is not rotting, they actually took her body, which tells me that it is needed for whatever is going to happen next to her. So, I doubt Odin has to make her a new body. My guess is that maybe she'll just need some physical therapy, like Harry after Demonreach and the failed suicide. I still do think that Battle Ground is Murphy's version of Changes. She's been following a similar path to Harry's.

Oh, and about the body type, well Gard in Aftermath, when she tells Murph that her boss (Vadderung) might be interested in talking to her, she says "you've even got the hair for it", which means that she has more that one requirement down, the physical aspect of it being the least important one. And most importantly, I think it means means that Valkyries can be "made".

I think maybe it's something that can be offered, maybe it's something that can be obtained. I can imagine that it would make sense that Murph was taken as an Einherjar, but is later offered the opportunity to become a Valkyrie. Of course, there's some challenge, ritual, something that she has to pass, and Murph being Murph of course would take on the challenge, because that woman is not going to wait for eternity to join the fight again, we know her. (also WOJ is that she'd want to survert the rules). We also know that she will want to prove herself. That's how she built up her whole life. It fits her.

Note that the Dr's typically like to leave a cast on broken bones beyond the point that the bones are healed-enough for light-use.

The point of the break will still be very tender (and much more susceptible to being re-broken!) but you can use the limb for most ordinary things.

I was presuming that was the stage Murphy was at, when she took off her own cast.

It is mentioned in Peace Talks that she only had four more days left in the casts when she took them off, so yeah, she was mostly healed, there was nothing miraculous about her taking off the casts when she did and being able to move.

So we don't know for sure if Lara still gets burned by his touch. It could be that the protection is gone because Karrin died. And she did die. Valhalla is the afterlife.

That is true, the protection has not been tested after Karrin's death yet. I imagine that is going to be one of the first things that we learn about in Twelve Months.

However, there might some reason to believe that her being dead doesn't really matter. It didn't matter what Susan was doing after she and Harry got separated, it didn't matter what Thomas was doing either for Justine to keep the protection, it only ever mattered what Harry and Justine did themselves to get the protection removed from themselves (sleeping with Luccio and other women, respectively).

I don't think it's 100% clear how the protection works really. I mean, in one book Thomas says Lara has a burn mark from a wedding ring, in Peace Talks it seems like it was only a mild burn what she got from Harry, but also true love is about supposed to be super rare, but Harry gets it twice in his short life (imo, it was ridiculous that he got it from Susan, but ymmv), then you have to add up some of the stuff that's been said in Something Borrowed about true love as well. It's all a bit inconsistent imo. Personally, I wonder how much of all of that is about conscious decisions. But anyway, ymmv about the philosophical concepts of what is love and all of that. I imagine that the next book will bring some clarification over this part of the lore.

One thing that JB has said though, that so far seems consistent through the books, is that the true love protection thing only happens between consenting adults, who mutually love each other and have shared the physicality of it, it doesn't take hold if you don't act on it.

IMO, it seems like a "mark" that is placed on you, that would stay until it gets removed by an act of rejection of it, ie sleeping with another person (because apparently not even time erases it, if we believe White Night).

But yeah, we don't know how death of one of the people involved affects it, my guess though, would be that it doesn't. Harry is still alive, he was already "marked" by true love, he would stay that way until he "rejects it" by being sexual with someone else.

Thank you, I'll check that out ...
 

as soon as I figure out where my walkabout copy of PT has gotten to...   

No worries, I got you:

...Lara was standing next to me, her bare shoulder against my elbow. My elbow approved, ecstatically—but Lara jumped and let out a little truncated sound of discomfort.
She glanced down at her shoulder, where a patch the shape, I guess, of the end of my elbow was turning red, as though she’d brushed it against a hot pan.
Vampires of the White Court had a severe allergy to sincere love, the way the Black Court doesn’t like sunbathing. Skin-to-skin contact with people who love and who are loved in return is hardest of all on the White Court.
Which meant that …
Oh.
Well. I hadn’t been thinking about having that aura of protection around me when Karrin and I got busy, but it was nice to have it.
And it was nice to know it was real. Very nice.
“Ouch,” Lara said, her tone annoyed. Then she glanced up at me and her expression became suddenly pleased. “Oh. You and the policewoman? Congratulations, wizard.”
Chapter 25 - Peace Talks

Many of us (including me) vastly prefer to read, than be read-to.

Spending $5 on a single short already looks like an expensive way to get our Dresden fix... further reducing the value by making it an audio-only format is ... well... it's insult to injury, honestly.

It's not audio-only, it's a on book (text) format on kindle, audio on audible.

ah see, yea. I wouldn't have really considered it to be shapeshifting, but coming from the author.. Jim tends to say things that we don't actually have the full context to but can be very good for guesswork and theorizing at what the context we're missing is. He's gotten better at it over the years actually. Last couple years of his he's been dropping subtle but very telling lines in his replies.

What I didn't remember but found interesting now that I've listened to the answer again, is that he also mentions Marcone in this, and how they could work together. Like you say, food for theories...