On this blog, I have endeavored to review books by as many different authors as possible, mostly avoiding doing more than one by the same person. Now, however, I’m discovering favorite writers which I feel deserve additional attention. One of these is KW Jeter, the actual inventor of the word “steampunk.” His first novel in […]
Having focused on steampunk for the last few years, I was astonished that I hadn’t run into this book before. Homunculus was published in 1986 before steampunk became all the rage in the 2000’s. It won the Phillip K. Dick award for best original paperback in 1988. Many steampunk books are modern-style novels that happen […]
While attending a movie recently, I was astonished to see a trailer for an upcoming steampunk movie, Mortal Engines. I had heard of the 2001 book by Philip Reeve but hadn’t read it. The premise was very imaginative albeit somewhat silly: in a post-apocalyptic world, cities went mobile to survive. They became huge steam-powered edifices […]
This charming 2009 book by Gail Carriger (pen name of Tofa Borregaard, a more interesting name in my opinion) has an intriguing premise. Its protagonist is a woman with no soul. Unlike Bart’s nightmarish experience on The Simpsons , her lack of a soul doesn’t seem to be a problem. The main effect of her […]
The Crystal Palace was one of the signature landmarks of Victorian London. It was built to house the Great Exhibition of 1851, which showcased many of the wonders of the Industrial Revolution. After the Exhibition ended it was moved to a park on Sydenham Hill and remained there until it was destroyed by fire in […]
