Fantasy Book Critic: "Clockwork Heart's" author Dru Pagliasotti sells second novel to Apex

Order "Clockwork Heart" as a multiple format e-book HERE

Another less-well known gem, "Clockwork Heart" by Dru Pagliasotti is a wonderful, wonderful novel for which the sequel (being written as of now) is a highly awaited book for me, though it works very well as a standalone too. I found out about it by chance - possibly from a recommendation by someone who loved "The Alchemy of Stone" by Ekaterina Sedia as I did since the two novels share some similarities - and I read it this year so it kind of fell through the cracks both in terms of FBC reviewing and inclusion in my best of 2008, both which would have happened were I to have known about this novel in 2008.

From my mini-review on Goodreads:

"Very entertaining steampunk adventure with a dash of romance and mystery.

Ondinium is a city powered by the magic substance that gives its name, has a powerful calculating engine at its heart, and is divided in 3 caste areas at 3 levels on a mountain, one per caste, higher up of course, with the powerful "exalted" actually hedged by so many traditions and customs - in public they cannot show their faces, they have to wear some kind of robes - that the more rebellious ones go outcaste to have the freedom of the regular people; there is a cable car system, and (mechanically) winged humans called Icarii that are messengers and do not belong to any caste.

Taya is one such Icarii coming from a prosperous middle class family - her father runs a factory; she saves an exalted woman and her son from a collapsing cable car and attracts the attention of two exalteds brothers, one a "programmer" and Council politician, the other a rebellious outcaste watchmaker that lives discreetly near Taya's former neighborhood.

Add in spies from neighboring powers who want the secrets of Ondinium, dissidents, sabotage and you get an unexpectedly fun sff adventure."

So I was delighted to find out that Ms. Pagliasotti sold her second novel "Agreement with Hell" to Apex books to be published in 2010 and of course I hope that the next adventure of Taya will see print publication soon too.

12:05 PM |

Posted by Liviu |

|

Edit Post

3 comments:

SQT said...: I loved "Clockwork Heart." I can't wait to see what the next book is like.; July 16, 2009 at 1:36 PM
Liviu said...: The second novel looks interesting and I will take a look for sure but I want more Ondinium :)

Mihai's (Dark Wolf) recent post on Alchemy of Stone reminded me of this one and how we did not mention it here on FBC so i decided to rectify that asap...; July 16, 2009 at 2:45 PM
Kelci said...: I will definitely have to read "Clockwork Heart" now.; January 2, 2010 at 1:54 PM