Monday, October 8, 2018

SciFi/Fantasy Book Review: Clockwork Boys by T Kingfisher




Clockwork Boys is the first of a duology of short novels by T Kingfisher (which for those who don't know, is children's fantasy author Ursula Vernon's adult fantasy pen name).  For those unfamiliar with Vernon/Kingfisher, her fantasy works exhibit an incredible amount of imagination, often resulting in some pretty unique combinations of ideas, with wit and humor even in some stories that can get pretty dark.

Clockwork Boys is pretty much exactly that - a dark (though not TOO dark) fantasy story featuring a series of DnD like characters (A Paladin, a Rogue, an Assassin, and a Monk) on a suicide mission against a foe that has seemingly been unstoppable.  It's very enjoyable....but also very much half of the story to be told, with the second half clearly saved for the sequel.  Still, for the price it is online ($4.99), it's worth a look:


------------------------------------------------Plot Summary------------------------------------------------
Slate just wanted to remain an....well, not honest, but an excellent master forger, but when a war caused some people in power to look more closely at some "official" documents, she found herself with a death sentence....unless she could succeed at what she is sure is a suicide mission: to get to Anuket City, home of the enemy attacking the city, to discover the truth behind the monstrosities known as the "Clockwork Boys," which are destroying the army with ease and seem unstoppable.

And so, with the aid of her sixth sense (which smells annoyingly like Rosemary), she recruits her team:  Brenner, a master assassin, Learned Edmund, a misogynistic monk, and Caliban, a disgraced Paladin and demon-hunter imprisoned for, well, being possessed by a demon himself and slaughtering some nuns.  Each marked with a tattoo that will kill them if they betray their mission - a mission that has killed two other teams already.

Assuming of course they don't kill each other first.
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Clockwork Boys' plot is relatively straightforward (well, as much as any Vernon work is, which is to say, somewhat so, but with some crazy ideas along the way) but where it shines is in its characters, particularly its two leads: Slate and Caliban.  The story switches off between these two characters' points of view throughout and both are rather interesting leads.

Caliban is essentially the reason why this book exists - with Vernon expressing annoyance on twitter and in the acknowledgements in how Paladins have been portrayed in media due to DnD rules, and Caliban being her response.  And he's definitely different - he may be "fallen" (due to his actions while possessed and his god no longer supporting him), but Caliban is hardly evil, and still wants to do good....but is just unsure of what to do in order to achieve this.  He's afraid of his own impulses, and the result makes him seem like a stick in the mud to others (and prevents him from acting upon what is actually a mutual attraction to Slate).  He's earnest without being totally naive - he's still a little naive of course about chaotic methods employed by his companions as you might expect since he IS lawful like a classic Paladin, but he's not a nutjob about his lawfulness and the result is a character with a genuine conflict that's easy to root for.

Slate is a bit less unique of a character, but she works similarly as well.  A forger who has a talent for noticing magic/important things/objects which she really would rather not have, Slate's journey here is a lot more interesting than it seems on the surface and probably the most complete journey in this novel, as she realizes something about herself she didn't really realize before.  Of course, in the process she takes a leadership role which she doesn't really want but feels obligated to, and her attraction to Caliban is pretty interesting, especially with the assholey way he seems to respond (for reasons we can understand due to his point of view parts).  She works pretty well.

If Clockwork Boys has some flaws, it's in its pacing.  This novel is rather short, and while Vernon/Kingfisher stated in her acknowledgements that combining it with its successor would be too long, the result is a novel that quite clearly feels like the first half of a greater story that doesn't quite have a satisfying ending.  The tone of the book also changes quite a bit in the final third - whereas it's a dark but often witty (but still serious) story for 2/3, the final conflict of this story loses the wit entirely, and its a little notable.  It still works rather well, and sets up the next novel in a way that makes me want to continue on (which I know I will), but it's still a thing.

I'm not sure when I will purchase, nevertheless read, the successor to finish this story, but I suspect it'll happen soon, because this is definitely an interesting start, even if not enough of its own volume to make me quite happy.

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