Karissa E. (ophelia99) reviewed on 3/21/2018 + 2527 more book reviews

This is another book in a line of steampunk reads lately that was somewhat disappointing to me. This was an okay read and technically steampunk; although mainly this is a pretty standard mystery type of story. The characters were fairly bland and I felt the writing style itself was a bit devoid of personality. Nothing about this book really grabbed me and sucked me in.

At times I felt like the author had a checklist of steampunk elements he had to include to make this more steampunky: airships...check, zombies...check, cool weaponized cane...check, laudanum...check, etc. etc. While it contained a lot of steampunk elements that story actually wasn't very steampunk in feel or philosophy. There are a lot of very standard ideas in here and it made for a book that just wasn't very unique or exciting...and at times was just plain boring.

I was disappointed in the characters as well. I had high hopes when Hobbes entered the picture; she was smart, tough...and ended up being absolutely thin as a character throughout. The best scenes in here are between her and her sister. She just didn't have enough dimension and wasn't engaging enough. Newbury, our supposed hero, was supposed to be very Sherlock-like but he missed glaringly obvious clues throughout which was frustrating. Then somehow, despite his injuries, towards the end of the book he gained almost superhuman abilities...I mean really he didn't...but the way he functioned while injured was completely unrealistic and worthy of a solid eye-roll.

Overall this was another disappointing steampunk read for me. I absolutely love this genre but I have been struggling lately to find anything decent written in it. I have a few more steampunk series on my shelves to try out so hopefully I will find something good soon. Not recommended and I won't be reading more of the series.

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