Review of A Conspiracy of Alchemists – Book 1 of The Chronicles of Light and Shadow by Liesel Schwarz

This book is something of a genre mashup – it certainly has strong steampunk elements in it, and the early descriptions of the airship are especially enjoyable. But it is also part romance and part Fantasy, with a strong and well-designed world in which the failing warlocks are desperately trying to rally their fading forces against the powerful, well organised alchemists.

When dirigible pilot Elle Chance accepts an unusual cargo in Paris, she finds herself in the middle of a deadly war between the Alchemists and Warlocks. The Alchemists will stop at nothing to acquire the coveted carmot stone and its key, and Elle must do everything in her power to thwart their diabolical plans.

I felt Schwarz managed to achieve a strong sense of the Edwardian era in her writing, without unduly holding up the action. The period details and customs were well depicted and, particularly the scenes in Constantinople which were full of colour and a number of interesting characters. Schwarz’s lively and pacey writing style is well suited to keeping the tension going in a variety of settings, without losing a sense of place.

Elle is also an engaging heroine – a suitably plucky gel, with plenty of the intrepid drive that finally won women the vote. Her determination to break away from the boring, narrow life of a married woman of the time was both appealing and convincing. However, I was less persuaded by the romantic thread running through the story. Mr Marsh is an interesting character in his own right – and his views on women and their role in society certainly is of the time. The trouble was, this part of the story suddenly seemed to fall into a clichéd dance that didn’t happen in the rest of the narrative. So I found I was slightly skimming the scenes between the two protagonists in order to get to the more interesting plotlines. Fortunately, there is plenty going on that is great fun, so that this was a minor disappointment rather than a big deal.

As the story romped to the climax, I stayed up reading until the small hours to find out what happens – and Schwarz manages to bring this slice of the story to a satisfying conclusion, while leaving some interesting plotlines dangling for the next instalment. Patrice, in particular, is an intriguing villain who kept popping up throughout the book and promises to figure prominently in the next slice of this adventure. Which I shall definitely be looking forward to with interest and anticipation. Steampunk can only benefit with a series like this to add to the genre.
8/10

Review of The Immorality Engine – A Newbury & Hobbes Investigation by George Mann

This book is the third full length novel in this steampunk adventure series set squarely in Victorian times.  Sir Maurice Newbury and his feisty sidekick Veronica Hobbes are called on to investigate a wave of crimes identical to committed by a murderer who the police have just found dead. Their enquiries lead them to the Bastion Society, and personal physician to Queen Victoria, Dr Lucius Fabian. Why is he so interested in Veronica’s sister, Amelia, and can Newbury and Veronica help free her from a terrible fate as a slave to the Empire?

I’ve enjoyed this series so far – but for my money, this is the book where all the ingredients mix together to provide a really gripping story with some horrific overtones. And the steampunk adventure stops being some slightly daft version of Sherlock Holmes and hits its stride.

Maurice Newbury is fighting his own demons – and the consequences of his experimentation bite deep into his personal life and create major strains in his partnership with Veronica Hobbes. Who has major problems of her own, given her concern and guilt about her sister’s fate… These internal conflicts add extra depth to these two characters, whose rather breezy attitude to date gave this series a certain amount of charm – but also allowed us to dismiss the shenanigans going on in Mann’s version of Victorian England as an amusing pastiche of the darker reality. It was also enjoyable to see that one of the characters who has regularly turned up as a regular bit player in the earlier books, Inspector Bainbridge, has been given a far larger slice of the action this time around – to the extent that we actually see the action through his viewpoint on several occasions.

There is a sombre feel to this novel that gives it extra edge, right from the beginning, with the bleak funeral scene that wouldn’t look out of place in a Dickens novel. Queen Victoria is something of a shock – the terrifying monster lurking in the shadows and kept alive by her steam-driven chair is a world away from the white haired matron we are used to seeing adorning various history books and stamps.

What hasn’t changed, is the speed at which the narrative whisks along. Mann is adept at interleaving the necessary scene setting with the various actions scenes that regularly punctuate this engrossing book. While the previous steampunk adventures have always been entertaining – which was why I made a point of picking up this book – this time the narrative braids all the various sub-plots into a really satisfying climax that contributed to the explosive denouement – literally. The fall-out from all the action is equally intriguing and the final hook has left me determined to track down the sequel, The Affinity Bridge. Where I enjoyed the previous books, this one is my favourite steampunk novel to date – and I’m very much hoping that the next book will deliver yet more steam-driven goings on with a same calibre.
10/10

Review of Wizard Undercover – Book 4 of the Rogue Agent series by K.E. Mills

If you happen to come upon this book and you haven’t read the three previous books, The Accidental Sorceror, Witches Incorporated and Wizard Squared – don’t. Go back to the beginning and track down these other books, first. Otherwise there will be a whole raft of asides and references that you will simply miss or find irritating, which would be a real shame.

This is a really interesting fantasy series – it started off quite light with plenty of humour and some sharp-tongued exchanges between the main characters, who nonetheless are very fond of each other. But in the third book of the series, the whole premise takes a left turn into something a whole lot nastier and darker, making Wizard Squared a compelling page-turner. So, can Mills sustain that angst and tension in Wizard Undercover?

Wedding bells are ringing for the constantly battling nations of Splotze and Borovnik and the upcoming royal nuptials could at last put an end to their dangerous hostilities. But in a development that hardly bodes well, one of Gerald’s fellow janitors goes missing – after delivering a dire warning of danger surrounding the marriage treaty. So Gerald must embark on a perilous mission to uncover the troublemakers, before wedded bliss becomes international war. But going undercover isn’t as easy as it looks, even with Melissande and Emmerabiblia for camouflage. Soon Gerald finds himself fighting for his life as well as world peace.

But poor old Gerald is still reeling from his terrible experiences in the previous instalment – should someone still traumatised and possibly unstable be sent out without a suitable recovery time? And if international relations and potential war looms, is that sufficient reason to also risk two spirited young women? These are the kinds of moral questions that confronts Gerald’s devious superior, Sir Alec.

Other than that, we still have the wonderfully bossy Reg, a talking bird who has adopted Gerald and has a frighteningly indepth knowledge of all sorts of gnarly magic – although there are now some uncomfortable issues around Reg, after the fallout from shocking events described in the previous book… There is a love interest between Gerald and his best friend’s sister, Emmerabiblia Markham. However after the last book, where all these characters were confronted with a terrible evil and many of them simply didn’t prevail, there is the after-echo of that experience that still reverberates through this story. I found it added a darker twist that Mills skilfully played on throughout the book.

I was worried that after the last book, I would find this something of an anti-climax, but of course Mills is far too experienced and adept to commit that kind of crime against her readers. While this episode in the series doesn’t hit the same savage climaxes as those in Wizard Squared, there is still plenty of tension and pace as Gerald desperately tries to pinpoint exactly who is creating such vile magic. I also very much appreciated the fact that Mills isn’t minded to roll her adventures blithely forward without showing the battle scars still evident in all her main characters after their terrible experiences. All in all, a great addition to the series which left me wanting more.
8/10

Review of A Red Sun Also Rises by Mark Hodder

Mark Hodder, known for his successful Victorian steampunk Burton and Swinburne series, has now given us this offering, due to be published in 2013.

Transported to the alien world of Ptallaya by a strange and terrifying ritual, Victorian missionary Aiden Fleischer and his brilliant but damaged assistant, Clarissa Stark, are stranded. Befriended by the Yatsill, a race of bizarre telepathic alien mimics, the travellers watch in amazement as the society around them transforms into a parody of London. But as the dual yellow suns of this new world slowly set, a red sun is also rising, and with it come the Blood Gods, an ancient and indestructible evil…

And there you have it… At least a tiny slice – because Hodder is very adept as covering a lot of story in a relatively short space. This – in the best tradition of the genre – is certainly action-packed and Hodder manages many nods to the original derring-do adventure stories that some of us were brought up on, without jarring modern sensibilities. It’s a very neat trick and lot harder to pull off than Hodder makes it look.

As well as ensuring that his writing style has the right period feel, which means that he can’t use all those nifty modern words with their snappy punch – he also manages to give us a real insight into Fleischer’s disturbed mental landscape. Fleischer is well and truly messed up… a failing vicar, whose parishioners appeal to be deserting him in droves, he opens the door to a vagabond woman and takes her in – which proves to be a life-changing moment. The historical backstory that he provides at the start of the book provides extra poignancy by the end, when we really care about Aiden Fleischer. While ensuring that the main character is suitably complex and interestingly flawed, Hodder also whisks us along a truly out of this world story at a breathless pace, throwing in all sorts of interesting twists so that the reader is constantly having to revise her initial impression of what is going on, as the protagonist learns more about the situation(s) that he is trying to grapple with.

Clarissa Stark is Aiden’s fascinating sidekick. There is a certain tongue in cheek treatment of this female paragon, which I found amusing and works well, given Aiden’s evident inexperience with the opposite sex. As for the world in which they find themselves stranded – an awful lot happens. And it is to Hodder’s credit that I managed to keep track of it all – with the possible exception of some of those fiendishly complicated alien names…

The faux London is a delight – there were all sorts of little details that the aliens included which poked fun at the Victorian era, while fully exploiting this period of gung hoe exploration, where intrepid Brits swarmed over the planet, heedless of some shocking conditions… Hodder’s protagonists show the same dauntless spirit here, and there were a couple of times when I read the list of injuries they had endured and yet still managed to march ever forward. Did it matter that in reality, they probably would have pegged out during the first night? Not in the slightest.

All in all, this is a delightful read. I’m not the most ardent fan of steampunk and yet found it an enjoyable, engrossing adventure. I’ll certainly be looking out for the sequel.
9/10

Review of Mainspring by Jay Lake

This interesting science fiction, alternate history offering is a twist on the steampunk genre that has become so popular. In Lake’s detailed world the big difference is that God has constructed a clockwork Earth that runs on huge brass runners that follow the equator in the form of a huge wall – so here is an example of clockpunk.

Her Imperial Majesty Queen Victoria still rules New England and her American Possessions; the Royal Navy rules the skies with its might Airships; and Earth still turns on God’s great brass gears of Heaven as it makes its orderly passage around the Lamp of the Sun from Midnight to Midnight and Year to Year.

In the town of New Haven, a Clockmaker’s young apprentice is visited at midnight by a brass Angel, and told that he, and he alone, can find the Key Perilous to rewind the Mainspring of the Earth. If he does not, the planet will wind down, and life will cease.

And there you have it. A classic Quest plot, complete with naïve yet obscurely talented youngster, who finds himself ranged against forces far greater than his own slender resources… Cosily familiar in so many ways. And this is no accident. In tone and plot progression, this book relies on many forerunners of the Hero Quest genre – I was reminded of H. Rider Haggard’s novels when reading this book.

Hethor is an excellent young hero, whose initial assumptions become thoroughly overturned as he progresses through a series of engrossing adventures – including a gripping interlude on an airship, which I thoroughly enjoyed. Told in limited third person POV, the success of this ambitious book lies in Lake’s storytelling skills and ability to weave a complex world through the eyes of an inexperienced youngster without losing pace. No mean feat. And one that Lake pulls off with surefootedness that marks him out as One To Watch.

It takes great technical ability to meld modern tastes with a writing style that more than nods in the direction of its 19th century forebears – and Lake avoids the pitfalls that could have so easily turned Mainspring into a stodgy-though-at-times interesting tale, or wincingly embarrassing read. And if I write that with feeling – it’s because I’ve read them when dipping into the steampunk genre, and a major reason why it isn’t my favourite sub-genre.

Lake manages to immerse us in a Victorian experience without offending modern sensibilities by reprising the darker side of colonial adventuring that makes us uncomfortable these days when we read Haggard’s hero interacting with African inhabitants. He shows the same sensibility when Hethor falls in love – it wouldn’t have taken much to have marred the whole relationship by portraying a sense of superiority by the youngster.

Any grizzles? Well – there are some jarring moments. We always have a sense that Hethor is somehow uniquely talented in being able to sense the clockwork turning of the Earth, but this specialness is never fully explored. And a couple of times, I do feel that Lake leans far too heavily on Hethor’s abilities without actually properly explaining exactly what is going on. It’s a shame, as there are so many aspects of the world-building that are so slickly executed that I don’t believe that Lake didn’t actually know what propelled Hether to be able to do these things – I think these details just got buried in the plot momentum.

During all the adventuring, I was also fascinated by the questions thrown up by the failure in Earth’s mainspring – if God is such a perfect being, why has he produced a fault in the mainspring that creates the deaths of hundreds and thousands of people? Hethor has to work towards his own answers to that question – amid his interaction with some interesting antagonists who have come to a different conclusion.

If you are a fan of steampunk or alternate worlds, then this is a must-read novel. And if you aren’t – then try it anyway. As a slice of high octane adventure in a wonderfully described alternate world it takes a lot of beating.
8/10

Review of The Island – A Noreela novel by Tim Lebbon

Tim Lebbon’s name keeps cropping up in chats with speculative fiction fans, so when I saw this book on the shelves, I decided it would be worth a read.

Kel Boon thinks he has managed to escape his past as an agent in the secret organisation the Core, protecting the blissfully unaware Noreelans from the threat of the lizard-like Strangers – creatures from beyond the known world capable of untold destruction. In the sleepy fishing village of Pavmouth Breaks, Kel has become a woodcarver, leaving fighting behind and forming a tentative relationship with trainee witch Namior.  But a storm is brewing and at its centre the witches sense something dark and deadly. What follows the wake of the storm threatens the Noreelans’ very way of life. With the people and land he loves in terrible danger, Kel quickly realises that he cannot escape his past.

Yes… I know it sounds fairly run of the mill – but it isn’t. For starters, Lebbon is excellent at delivering tension-filled fear without slowing down the action – partly because he is an extremely competent writer who keeps all the action centred around Kel and Namior. The terrible storm and the havoc it wreaks on the fishing community is very well portrayed as the villagers struggle to come to terms with the devastating waves that sweep away their homes, families and livelihoods. Kel is conscious that he doesn’t belong as he watches everyone around him grapple with the enormity of the disaster – and it is that sense of detachment, along with his Core training, that has him already alert for any possible threats. That and the inexplicable disappearance of magic… This tale is a real genre mash-up – dark fantasy, swords and sorcery and steampunk. I have seen claims that it qualifies as science fiction, but I personally think that there would need to be more emphasis on the technology to tick that box. Not that it really matters – it doesn’t stop this being a cracking read. While Lebbon has written other books set in this world, he has ensured that it is a standalone novel, so no one will find their enjoyment blunted by picking up this book before visiting any of the other Noreela books.

Kel’s character leaps off the page right from the start and his hopes, personal demons and increasing concern at what is happening was, for me, the reason to keep turning the pages. Namior, his lover and young witch who has been born and raised in the small community all her life, wasn’t quite as strong. She certainly suffers in comparison to O’Peeria, Kel’s former Core partner. Although we only learn about O’Peeria in flashbacks through Kel’s point of view, the gutsy, foul-mouthed fighter immediately engaged my attention and loyalty in a way that Namior didn’t until much further into the book. However, this is a minor niggle and didn’t stop me staying up way into the night to discover what would happen next.

Lebbon can definitely weave an engrossing tale, full of menace and punctuated by bursts of sudden violence. I enjoyed the fact that though Kel is a trained killer, the fight scenes are less about swashing buckles and much more about the gritted business of surviving any encounter without major injury or death. The world-building is exceptional and I loved the descriptions of the island and the stricken fishing village, which were depicted with cinematic clarity. Overall, this is an outstanding tale. Now knowing why Lebbon is regarded with such respect by committed speculative fiction fans, I will be looking for his other work.
9/10

Review of Cyrus Darian and the Technomircron by Raven Dane

The Technomicron: ancient, deadly, powerful. In the 1860’s London every seeker of power – natural or supernatural – wants to wield it; and will stop at nothing to get it. Enter Cyrus Darian: hedonist, philanderer, alchemist and necromancer; hired by wealthy American Zachariah P. Dedman to find it. Dedman’s life, the honour of his beautiful haughty daughter Athena and the future of the world; all depend on Cyrus Darian. What could possibly go wrong?

I’ll come clean – steampunk isn’t my all-time favourite Fantasy genre. However, Dane doesn’t depict this particular slice of English history as any rose-tinted version of the burgeoning brutality of the Industrial Revolution – it is all shown in grubby detail with a reasonably clear-sighted view of just what was true the cost of all those steam gismos. Air pollution, dying vegetation and dirt, with a plummeting life expectancy for the poor souls trapped in English cities. Dane even describes a gloriously grandiose scheme to blow the toxic smog engulfing London out to sea.

But Dane gives herself an even greater challenge – Cyrus Darian is an anti-hero. Greedy, selfish and ambitious, his most constant companion is a fallen angel. This is tricky to really pull off successfully. Joe Abercrombie’s crippled torturer, Inquisitor Glokta, in his First Law series is the most convincing anti-hero I’ve encountered to date. But he is just one amongst a cast of strong, if flawed protagonists. Dane has chosen to construct the whole novel around Darian – so if we are too disgusted with his antics, there is nowhere else to go. We drop the book and find something else to read. Being the shallow, old fashioned sort of reader who enjoys rooting for the main protagonist, I was initially concerned that I wouldn’t want to bond with Darian – particularly as Dane chooses to dot around Darian’s timeline in the opening scenes. Personally, for me, this is the least successful part of the book. If I hadn’t already met and liked the author at Bristolcon, I may have abandoned the book right at the beginning and for those who are a bit underwhelmed at this patchy beginning, my advice is – persevere. It gets better. A lot better.

Because Dane manages to depict Darian as a thorough-going villain with a charismatic streak. And at no point did I feel that she flinched or side-stepped the harder or trickier aspects of this. So we are confronted with a main character who consistently doesn’t behave all that well… It could have all been a rather grim read, if the overall tone wasn’t briskly breezy with some nicely humorous touches – which isn’t to say that there aren’t also some genuinely shocking moments. What befalls Athena had my jaw dropping somewhat and I’m still slightly uncomfortable at that particular plotline – especially as we didn’t ever get to the bottom of who was exactly responsible for drugging her. However, it further establishes that Dane isn’t afraid to take risks as an author – while being capable of pulling them off.

Overall, this is a thoroughly accomplished, riveting read that certainly stands out from the crowd. If it is the start of a series, I’ll be looking out for the next instalment – and Dane’s other work. If it is as good as this, it’ll be worth it.
8/10

Review of The Osiris Ritual – A Newbury & Hobbes Investigation by George Mann

This enjoyable steampunk whodunit ticks all the boxes if you like your speculative fiction dosed with a liberal helping of Victoriana.  Death stalks London and the newspapers proclaim that a mummy’s curse has been unleashed. Sir Maurice Newbury, Gentleman Investigator for the Crown, is drawn into a web of occult intrigue as he attempts to solve the murders. And he soon finds himself on the trail of a rogue agent – a man who died to be reborn as a living weapon.

Newbury’s able assistant, Miss Veronica Hobbes, has her own mystery to unravel. Girls are going missing from a magician’s theatre show. But what appears to be a straightforward investigation puts Miss Hobbes in mortal danger.

Can Newbury save his assistant, solve the riddle of the mummy’s curse, capture the deadly man-machine – and stop the terrifying Osiris Ritual from reaching its infernal culmination?

This is the second book in this series, although I haven’t read the first offering. Does that matter? While the whodunit plotlines powering the book certainly are completely stand-alone and brought to a satisfactory conclusion, I did feel that Mann could have spared a bit more time and effort bonding his readership with his two protagonists. I certainly think the scene where Veronica Hobbes visits her sister should be earlier in the book than Chapter 8 – because that ongoing puzzle was the one that really caught my interest and lifted our plucky heroine from the obligatory female sidekick to a more three dimensional character.

Apart from that one grizzle, Mann clearly had a blast writing this book – his depiction of the world crackles with energy and he effectively captures the customs and speech rhythms of the era, without silting up the narrative pace. In fact, the story pitches forward at a fairly cracking rate with all sorts of mayhem ensuing. Mann deftly handles the various plotlines and writes the action scenes with plenty of clarity, while giving us a ringside seat of how all this is affecting his protagonists – a more technically challenging task than it looks.

If you are a fan of this sub-genre, with pea-soup fogs and steam-powered gismos doing it for you, then you’ll definitely enjoy pacing the cobbled streets along with Newton and Veronica. And if you occasionally venture into this corner of speculative fiction when you want a break from faster-than-light travel, or conflicted sword-waving misfits – you’ll find plenty here to provide page-turner appeal and whisk you back to an age where they don’t make ‘em like that, anymore.
8/10

Review of Terminal World by Alastair Reynolds

Reynolds is one of the foremost hard science fiction authors around these days and anything he writes is worth reading. Most of his previous work is set out in space, a looong way in the future, peopled with enigmatic, post-human characters. However, his writing style appears to be changing – Century Rain was set far closer to home and Floyd, the main protagonist, was sufficiently complex yet familiar to make me really care what would happen to him. In Terminal World, Reynolds gives us Quillon, another intriguing, likeable character with his own set of secrets.

Spearpoint, the last human city, is an atmosphere-piercing spire of vast size. Clinging to its skin are the zones, a series of semi-autonomous city-states, each of which enjoys a different – and rigidly enforced – level of technology. Horsetown is pre-industrial; in Neon Heights they have television and electric lights…

Following an infiltration mission that went tragically wrong, Quillon has been living incognito, working as a pathologist in the district morgue. But when a near-dead angel drops onto his dissecting table, Quillon’s world is wrenched apart one more time. For the angel is a winged posthuman from Spearpoint’s Celestial Levels – and with the dying body comes bad news.

If Quillon is to save his life, he must leave his home and journey into the cold and hostile lands beyond Spearpoint’s base, starting an exile that will take him further than he could ever have imagined. But there is far more at stake than just Quillon’s own survival, for the limiting technologies of the zones are determined not by governments or police, but by the very nature of reality – and reality itself is showing worrying signs of instability…

This fascinating world is sliced up into zones that change the rules at sub-atomic levels, therefore in some zones nothing more sophisticated than steam engines will work, while in others the level of technology is far greater. And then, there is a large dead zone, where nothing lives.  This is a complicated world that isn’t perfectly understood by anyone living there. Quillon, however, becomes uniquely qualified to discover as much about it as anyone else, especially once he is captured by the Swarm, a large community of people who constantly travel by airship.

As ever with Reynolds’ work, the scope of this book is ambitious and as I found myself swept up into Quillon’s initial plight, I thoroughly enjoyed the ride. Steampunk isn’t a particular ‘thing’ of mine, but the Swarm’s journey through the newly exposed zone that was previously impenetrable for five thousand years, is one of the main highlights of the book. And it’s a book that is packed with incident and unfolding information about this original and interesting world. The ending satisfactorily tied up many of the main storylines – so long as this is the start of a new series.

I haven’t seen any indication that Reynolds intends to write more books featuring this planet, but if he doesn’t, then there are far too many dangling threads left waving in the breeze. In Terminal World, he has laid the groundwork for a whole raft of really interesting scenarios, which never get more than a fleeting mention, such as exactly how the zone changes will affect the skullboys, Horsetown or the Celestial Levels. What exactly was Spearpoint for? What will happen to the Swarm? These are questions that Reynolds raises – and never really properly answers. If Terminal World isn’t a one-off offering, then that’s fine; I’ll just wait for the next slice of steampunk adventure to hit the bookshops. However, if this is it – then, Reynolds is guilty of seriously short-changing his readership.
8/10

Review of “Empire in Black and Gold” – Book One of “Shadows of the Apt” by Adrian Tchaikovsky

Enjoy smoothly told High Fantasy? Let’s see – there has to be a cast of well-fleshed characters fighting against an evil Empire and a satisfyingly complex villain, which you almost feel sorry for – until you discover exactly what he’s done… And the third person POV needs to move slickly between the characters with none of that jolting irritation because you’ve become too strongly attached to one of character’s storylines over the rest… Oh – and the battle scenes have to be packed with plenty of high octane action, clearly told and gripping because you really care what happens to the main protagonists.
Have I left anything out? Hm… Well, there has to be some new fresh angle on this oft-trod path – otherwise you might as well reread one of your very well-thumbed favourite books. What if this tale is set in a world where various human tribes take on the aspects and appearance of various insect species?
Welcome to Adrian Tchaikovsky’s Shadow of the Apt series. Master Stenwold Maker of the Beetle-kinden survived to flee the city of Myna after it was invaded by the Wasp Empire. But, haunted by the knowledge that the Wasps won’t be satisfied with just one city, once he is established at the Collegium, he spends his time trying to warn the squabbling Lowland factions of the threat the Black and Gold Empire poses. Stenwold also uses his position as a respectable academic to pick out promising graduates to gather information about the Wasps – in short, he has set himself up as a spymaster. But he doesn’t bargain on his young niece, Cheerwell Maker and her group of friends to become involved as the Wasps suddenly make their move…
As with all above average Fantasy series, Tchaikovsky’s world is intriguingly complex. This is not a peaceful society. The highly organised, telepathic Ant-kinden spend their time fighting other Ant communities. Meanwhile, Beetles trade and mostly make the new artefacts which are spreading throughout the world. The Moths, Mantids and Spiders used to dominate the other kinden, but their inability to grasp the most basic piece of machinery means their numbers and importance are dwindling. However, they still have access to potent and highly secret magic. But Tchaikovsky manages to blend these insect characteristics with human traits convincingly, giving a fresh slant to the inhabitants of his classic tale. The steampunk technology also has some enjoyable ‘insect’ twists.
Tchaikovsky also raises the question of where loyalty to a nation stops and personal morality starts as we follow the fortunes of Wasp Captain Thalric. And Maker Stenwold’s guilt at sending out young spies who often die is another side of the same issue – does Stenwold’s personal conviction that the Wasps are going to attack allow him to continue using young lives? While the rigid kinden rules often break down for half-breeds, who fail to be fully accepted within any of the insect tribes.
All in all, this satisfying and substantial read is one that I thoroughly recommend – particularly as I found the sequel, Dragonfly Falling every bit as engrossing and well written and I look forward to getting hold of the third book, Blood of the Mantis, sometime soon.
9/10