Review: Path of Beasts

Path of Beasts

by Lian Tanner

The Keepers, book three

 

Book Description:

The city of Jewel is in peril once again, as it is held captive by the frightful Fugleman, his band of Blessed Guardians, and an army of merciless mercenaries. There's no doubt that Goldie and Toadspit want to get their city back, but how can a small group of children fight against such overwhelming forces of evil? And how, as Goldie is determined, can they avoid bloodshed in a war that will set thieves against soldiers, and trickery and deception against a mighty cannon that shoots cannonballs bent on destruction? As Toadspit fights the Fugleman in a duel to the death, Goldie must face her hardest task yet. If she is to save the city, she must walk the mysterious Beast Road, deep inside the Museum of Thieves. No one knows where it goes and no one has ever returned from it.

 

Review:

An amazing end to the trilogy. While I felt that things were not quite as strong in book two as they were in the first (which I absolutely loved!), I am sooo pleased to say that book three did not disappoint in the least. Goldie, Toadspit, Bonnie, Mouse, and even Pounce team up to save their city, defeat the evils they could face directly, and even indirectly, and each finds the place they belong forever.

Strong characters, an intriguing and danger-filled plot, and a Museum that once again left me longing for a chance to explore it... this book packed quite the punch. I cannot wait to read more from this author, even though this particular story may be finished.


Review: City of Lies

City of Lies

by Lian Tanner

The Keepers Trilogy, book two

 

Book Description:

Goldie Roth is a trained thief and a skilled liar. Along with her friend Toadspit, she's supposed to be one of the Keepers of the mysterious Museum of Dunt. But although she desperately wants to be a Keeper, she will not leave her sick parents to do so. But when Toadspit's sister Bonnie is stolen, he and Goldie are forced to follow the child-stealers to the neighboring city of Spoke. Along the way, Toadspit too is captured, and Goldie is caught up in the Festival of Lies, where every word she says means something else and no one can be trusted. There, Goldie discovers some dangerous secrets—secrets that the child-stealers will kill to protect. She will need all her skills as a thief and a liar if she is to survive and save her friends.

 

Review:

While I did not love this book as much as I did the first book in the series, Museum of Thieves, I did enjoy it a lot. I think that what was missing for me here was the actual Museum of Dunt.  It was such a huge PRESENCE in the first book and almost all of the action in this story takes place elsewhere. I did love following Goldie's adventures again and thought it was neat to see more of the larger world in this dystopian series, but I can't wait to get back to the Museum in book three!!



Review: Steampunk!

Steampunk! An Anthology of Fantastically Rich and Strange Stories

ed by Kelly Link and Gavin J. Grant

Book Description:

Imagine an altrnate universe where romance and technology reign. Where tinkerers and dreamers craft and re-craft a world of automatons, clockworks, calculating machines, and other marvels that never were. Where scientists and schoolgirls, fair folk and Romans, intergalactic bandits, utopian revolutionaries, and intrepid orphans solve crimes, escape from monstrous predicaments, consult oracles, and hover over volcanoes in steam-powered airships. Here, fourteen masters of speculative fiction, including two graphic storytellers, embrace the genre's established themes and refashion them in surprising ways and settings as diverse as Appalachia, Ancient Rome, future Australia, and alternate California. Visionaries Kelly Link and Gavin J. Grant have invited all-new explorations and expansions, taking a genre already rich, strange, and inventive in the extreme and challenging contributors to remake it from the ground up. The result is an anthology that defies the genre even as it defines it.

Review:
I adore steampunk. It's old, it's new, it's mechanical and magical, full of adventure and romance. It is a brilliant sub-genre. Traditionally steampunk means that the book is set in London, while Victoria was Queen, and unlike real life, steam power became the predominant power source.  So lots of flying machines, steam-powered vehicles, and cool gadgets!

That being said, I loved the concept of this anthology. It's like...steampunk twisted. These are tales that all have strong steampunk elements, yet push beyond what we think of as steampunk to become even more. Not a one is set in Victorian London, either!

My favorites from this anthology were Libba Bray's story about girl thieves who use a device to stop time so that they can rob trains, Kelly Link's tale of a girl who is bound to serve fairies and is only somewhat mollified by their mechanized trinket gifts, and Dylan Horrock's story about a girl from another world, trying to find herself in a flatter version of her own life. Each of these tales literally *sparkled* at me from off of the pages. *grins* The other tales were really well done, as well.

Reading this book felt like traveling the world in a dirigible with dashing young lads and lasses hanging off of the anchor ropes... *whoops, just had a Scott Westerfeld moment there, lol.* Anyway, though I didn't read it all in one go, each tale was enthralling in it's own way.