Matters of faith are not his job.
Bitter Gold Hearts is the third book of the Garrett, P.I. books by Glen Cook. It is a Fantastic Noir series set in a High Fantasy world. Garrett is a private investigator, former Marine, and Knight in Sour Armor working to solve a variety of cases with all the witches as well as other creatures about him.
It is a bad time to religion in TunFaire because a bunch of holy relics have been stolen from the Orthodox branch of the Hano worshipers of Karentine. No one has claimed credit and the Orthodox church has become the laughing stock of the city. This is something that Garrett finds hilarious given his own Naytheist views.
Garrett finds himself contacted by a beautiful woman named Jill Craight, who he immediately attemps to fob onto Saucerhead because he doesn't want the case. Similarly, he is contacted by Magister Peridont, who wants him to recover the aforementioned religious relics for the main Church (as opposed to the Orthodox). Unfortunately, despite refusing this, he finds himself soon targeted by people who have a more than passing interest in the case.
Teaming up with a young street urchin named Maya, Garrett finds himself involved in matters both theological as well as political (and he hates both).
It is followed by Old Tin Sorrows.
Cold Coppper Tears contains the following tropes:
- Amazon Brigade: The Sisters of Doom, an all-girl street gang.
- Anticlimax: Morley kills Brother Jerce without Garrett ever meeting the man.
- Apocalypse Cult: The cult of the Devastator aims to release a world-destroying dark god from its prison. Lampshaded and deconstructed by the Dead Man, who points out that, subconsciously, the cultists don't really want to end the world, they're just morbid and petty enough to get a charge out of thinking they can.
- Baker Street Regular: Maya and the Sisters of Doom serve this purpose in the novel.
- Belief Makes You Stupid: Garrett has difficulty believing that Agire actually believes in his God and religion due to his belief that religion is a gigantic con game.
- Big Creepy-Crawlies: One of the eight-limbed manifestations took the form of a giant spider.
- Big Eater: Maya scarfs down any piece of food put in front of her, which impresses Garrett. Justified as she's a street urchin.
- Bittersweet Ending: The Brothers of Hanno are defeated, the other Loghyr is neutralized, but Peridont as well as Agire are dead. Jill Craight is also forced to turn herself over for the murders. The relics are also recovered but Garrett could care less about that.
- Black-and-White Morality: Part of what makes Garrett have such difficulty dealing with this plot is that the Church vs. Brothers of Hammon is one of these. He can't grock that they're willing to fight and die to save or destroy the world.
- Chekhov's Gun: The anti-thunder lizard amulet Garrett acquires from Chodo's men in Cold Copper Tears.
- Corrupt Church: Garrett more than makes his opinion known that he considers all religions to be this. It is so well-known that the Hano Church's Magistar knows it. Subverted by the fact Garrett has severe issues with the case because he cannot conceive that a church can NOT be this.
- Crystal Dragon Jesus: The central conflict is between the Hano worshipers of the mainline and Orthodox branches of the church. Both of them hate the other but are worried about people losing respect for their god whenever the other loses face.
- Cynic Cannot Comprehend Idealistic: Garrett's detective skills take a massive hit he overlooks several important clues because the idea the Church is acting in good faith, that Hanno's god is real, and everyone actually believes in their religion sincerely is impossible for him to parse.
- Dark and Troubled Past: Hester, the real name of Jill Craight, burned her family alive while trying to kill her abusive stepfather.
- The Dragon: Brother Jerce is the man behind the majority of the assassination attempts against Garrett but only a middle-man.
- Dramatic Irony: The Hano Church knows Garrett is a nonbeliever and this makes him the perfect person to hire in order to investigate the stolen relics.
- Femme Fatale: Garrett immediately pegs Jill Craight as one since she comes to him for protection when anyone who knows the circles that Garrett travels would have gone to Saucerhead instead.
- Gang of Hats: Lots of gangs of "chuckos" are race-specific, and the Sisters of Doom are both all-human and all-female. The Stompers from Cruel Zinc Melodies are an aversion, being about as generic as they come.
- God Guise: The insane dead Loghyr manipulates the Sons of Hammon this way. The Dead Man suggests this trope used to be a popular hobby for Loghyr to while away the Passing, but it's fallen out of fashion as his kind become rarer.
- Gods Need Prayer Badly: The Dead Man suggests that the only reason some gods are around at all is because humanity willed them into existence with the power of their faith.
- Groin Attack: Taken to Squicky extremes by the cultists. They remove the private parts of their victims.
- Hollywood Atheist: Garrett not only doesn't believe in gods but he actually is stunned to discover that anyone in the church actually believes in their religion. He believed it was all just one con game on the gullible. Dead Man stuns him by pointing out Agire actually does believe.
- I Have Many Names: Jill Craight goes by many aliases and desires to forget her original identity.
- Killed Off for Real: Pokey Pigotta is killed off in his second book.
- The Inquisitor General: Essentially what Magister Peridont's function within the Church is. He attempts to downplay this role for Garrett's benefit, which only makes him more suspicious.
- The Mistress: Donna Soldat serves as this for Magister Peridont.
- The Mole: Sampson proves to be working against the protagonists the entire time.
- Older Than They Look: Maya is actually eighteen and an adult. She just doesn't look like it due to her street rat clothing.
- Path of Inspiration: Dead Man says the Sons of Hammon is not actually led by a god but led by another dead Loghyr's ghost that is pretending to be one.
- Precocious Crush: Maya develops one of these and decides she's going to marry Garrett. Becomes less precocious when She Cleans Up Nicely, reveals she's eighteen, and sleeps with Garrett.
- Religion of Evil: The doomsday cult called the Sons of hammon. It is a nihilistic faith dedicated to the destruction of the world.
- She Cleans Up Nicely: Maya, whom neither Garrett nor Morley even recognize when they first see her dressed like a woman rather than a street-gang urchin.
- Too Dumb to Live: Garrett is said to be off limits by Chodo Contague and the Vampire gang assumes this is a good reason to attack him in order to make their rep. As such, they're all horribly killed.
- Your Mind Makes It Real: Dead Man confirms that gods can be created by belief and the Devastator (as well as Hano) are very real.
