100 Book Challenge - Book 38 - The Girl in the Clockwork Collar

Book 38 / 100

Book: The Girl in the Clockwork Collar (The Steampunk Chronicles #2)

Author: Kady Cross

ISBN: 978-0-373-21082-4

Pages: 368

Of course I had to get the second book in Kady Cross’s Steampunk Chronicles, who wouldn’t after the first one? And I wasn’t disappointed.

Following their friend Jasper across the ocean from London to New York, Finley Jayne and her band of misfits go head to head with a crime boss intent on using Jasper to locate the pieces of a machine. To what end? Well, that’s just one of the many things they’ll have to discover along the way.

Jasper meanwhile is in the clutches of Dalton, a ruthless man who is holding the life of the woman Jasper loves hostage with the help of a clockwork collar that will strangle her if the wrong person touches it.

As the story takes us from the rough streets of lower Manhattan to the elegant Fifth Avenue, we find Griffin King, The Duke of Greythorne at war with himself over his growing attraction to Finley, Sam, more machine than man, finds his heart being tested, and the sweet Irish Emily, who can talk to machines, finds that the streets can be dangerous if one isn’t careful.

To help her friends Finley must go undercover in Dalton’s gang. But can she pull herself away from the dark side after everything is done?

Rating… 5 out of 5 gears. While a few small bits dragged a little, overall this was a great read, I love the seamless blending of the late 1890s with the steam powered inventions, and I especially enjoyed the guest appearance by Nikola Tesla!

100 Book Challenge - Book 5 - The Girl in the Steel Corset

Book 5 / 100

Book: The Girl in the Steel Corset

Author: Kady Cross

ISBN: 978-0-373-21070-1

I came for the cover, I stayed for the story and the characters! Yes, I’ve read some bad reviews, but I think they didn’t read with an open mind… I loved this book.

Finley Jayne is not a normal young woman. A working class young woman in London in 1897 with a difference, the time and the woman. It’s a London where mechanical horses run amuck, automatons attack people and a waxwork of Queen Victoria has been stolen from Madame Tussauds!  Griffin King’s father, the late Duke of Greythorne had led an expedition to the centre of the earth and discovered an ore that generated energy, an ore that revolutionized the world. Finley’s father had experimented with something else, tiny organisms that were found there too, experiments that changed him permanently, changes he passed on to his daughter.

Joining forces with Griffin and his friends, Sam, Emily and Jasper, Finley finally finds a home for herself with others that have special powers. Griffin has a direct line to the Aether, Sam has the strength of many men, Emily is a genius and Jasper moves very, very fast. Together they learn the origin of their abilities and work together to defeat a plot against Queen Victoria.

In a world where the technology we have today is second nature, the steampunk world to Kady Cross’s London 1897 is like a breath of fresh air. It’s a world where robots, or automatons, act as assistants, waiters and servers, larger robots help to dig in the London Underground, and mechanical horse replace the more conventional horses. Battery powered lighting replaces gas and velocycles are the brand new form of transport. It’s London baby, but not as we know it.

Rating… 5 out of 5 gears. I would heartily recommend this book to anyone who enjoys alternate history, or steampunk, or a slightly different take on the idea of superheroes…