Steam, brass and clockwork

While perusing the blog over at Finding Wonderland, I heard that next week several websites will be participating in Steampunk/Alternate History Week, so I thought this would be the perfect time to declare my newfound love for all things steampunk.

My new favourite tv show is Sanctuary, a Canadian sci-fi fantasy series that originally started as a series of webisodes. With heavy steampunk leanings, Sanctuary is the story of Dr Helen Magnus, on a 150 year old British doctor, played by Amanda Tapping, who works to maintain the fragile balance between humans and sentient "abnormals". Magnus worked in Victorian England where she and several colleagues experimented with untainted vampire blood, with some unexpected results. A fun filled scifi steampunk romp with characters including Dr James Watson, the Invisible Man and, my personal favourite, the fabulously dastardly Nikola Tesla. Highly highly recommended! The creators of Sanctuary have started a new steampunk web series...Riese: Kingdom Falling - I for one will certainly be tuning in.

I also came home recently with quite a horde of new steampunk fiction and after finishing the first, I am well and truly hooked!

The Infernal Devices: Clockwork Angel - Cassandra Clare
The Mortal Instruments: City of Bones - Cassandra Clare
Court of the Air - Stephen Hunt
Soulless - Gail Carriger

My love for steampunk doesn't rest at books and tv though - check out these recent purchases ;)

What do you love about steampunk?

RIP V Challenge

Stupidly busy again so I haven't had the chance to finish my reviews, but here is my brief round up of Carl's fabulous RIP V Challenge.

I managed to get through more books than I hoped, but didn't get round to reading Dracula...maybe next year.

Books read:
The Hound of the Baskervilles - Sir Arthur Conan Doyle
Lonely Werewolf Girl - Martin Millar
Curse of the Wolf Girf - Martin Millar
White Crow - Marcus Sedgewick
The Collector - John Fowles

Looking forward to RIP VI!

White Crow - Marcus Sedgwick

Read for: RIP V Challenge, my love for Marcus Sedgwick!

Somehow I didn't even realise this had been published until reading Rhinoa's 5-star review. I ordered it immediately from my local library and was not disappointed. White Crow is a teen gothic fantasy, written by the incomparable Marcus Sedgwick.

Rebecca and her father move to the small countryside village of Winterfold, taking her away from a busy and far more exciting life in London. There, bitter at her father for the move, Rebecca wanders around the village, where she meets the strange, elfin girl, Ferelith. The two girls explore the history of the village and slowly uncover the terrifying secrets about experiments conducted by a mysterious seventeenth century doctor.

White Crow is a slow burn, gently introducing details about our two main characters, and the secrets and lies then uncover. The story slowly edges towards its creepy conclusion, as Rebecca's life unravels and the truth of her presence in Winterfold is revealed. Ferelith is indeed a strange creature. Her mannerisms and attitude to Rebecca is unsettling to say the least. And the unanswered question...what really lies beyond death.

Although aimed at teens, this is certainly more adult material. The atmosphere is deftly crafted, the uncomfortably hot summer against the chilly tale.

Fantastic stuff.

Other blog reviews:
Rhinoa's Ramblings
Books and other thoughts

The Collector - John Fowles

Read for: RIP V Challenge

Far ahead of his time, John Fowles wrote this dark classic in 1963, when I can only imagine it shocked readers as much as it can today. This is the disturbing tale of Frederick, a butterfly collector, who decides to 'collect' the object of his fantasies, a beautiful art student, Miranda.

After winning a large sum of money, Frederick meticulously plans the kidnapping, buying a house deep in the country with an outside basement, building a place to keep the captive Miranda. The plan goes flawlessly, and Frederick spends his days in the hope that Miranda will fall in love with him.

The Frederick we see is not a monster, but a lonely man, hopelessly in love with an otherwise unobtainable woman. Miranda sees this in him, and part of her understands this and even begins to sympathise with him. However, Miranda soon learns that she has underestimated Frederick and what he is capable of, as the story takes an even darker turn.

With the first half of this tale revolving around Frederick and the unfolding of his plan, I found myself enjoying the second half more, as we journey Miranda's experiences in the basement through reading her diary. There is also a thread of Shakespeare's The Tempest running through the novel, with Frederick identifying with Ferdinand and his love for Miranda, however she refers to him as Caliban throughout her diary.

Though perhaps a little overly long, I thoroughly enjoyed (and was creeped out by) this trip into the minds of an obsessive collector, and the object of his desire.

The Hound of the Baskervilles - Sir Arthur Conan Doyle

Read for: RIP V Challenge, Our Mutual Read Challenge

Despite never being particularly interested in the tales of Sherlock Holmes, I found myself gripped by the latest television adaptation of the famous sleuth's adventures. The BBC dramatisation was modern and inventive and persuaded me to try taste the source.

The Hound of the Baskervilles is perhaps the best known of Sir Arthur Conan Doyle's famous detective's cases. However, what I did not expect was that despite being Sherlock Holmes' case, this particular novel focuses far more on his loyal assistant and narrator, Dr John Watson.

Based on the legend of a ghost dog from my neck of the woods, the Hound of the Baskervilles is the tale of Sir Charles Baskerville who is found dead of a heartattack in the grounds of his home in the centre of Dartmoor. Fearing for the life of Sir Charles' successor, Henry, a family friend Dr Mortimer contacts Sherlock Holmes about the curse of the Baskervilles and invites him to investigate the mysterious death. While Holmes remains in London, Watson accompanies Henry to Dartmoor and thus the mystery unravels.

The plot is a classic, elements of which will be very familar to readers of more modern mysteries. It is the characters however that make Conan Doyle's work so entertaining. Watson is engaging and likeable, his intelligent everyman the perfect foil for Holmes' astonishing yet somewhat egotistical genius.

According to all-knowing Wikipedia, there have been 24 film adaptations of Hound of the Baskervilles prior to 2006, which goes to show the durability of Conan Doyle's work. I thoroughly enjoyed my first Sherlock novel and will seriously consider another!

The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo - Stieg Larsson

The internationally acclaimed Girl with the Dragon Tattoo is not a book that I would generally pick up; crime fiction is not really my thing. But just as with the Da Vinci Code, this was recommended to me by several people, and I was intrigued by the trailer for the Swedish film, so decided to give it a shot.

Unlike the Da Vinci code, I found this to be stimulating, enjoyable and very readable novel...despite some of the more graphic scenes that I could probably have done without.

The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo is Lisbeth Salander, a slightly unusual but highly gifted private investigator working in Stockholm. The titular girl is not the main protagonist in this first instalment. That falls to Mikail Blomkvist, the charming magazine publisher who at the start of the novel loses a libel case and exiles himself fom the business world to recover. He is soon approached to write a biography of the renowned Henrik Vanger, CEO of Vanger Enterprises, and his family. Part of his commission is also to investigate the disappearance of Vanger's great-niece decades earlier.

Yes this is a mainstream crime novel. But it is also primarily about sexual violence against women. Some of the descriptions are quite graphic and unpleasant and even shocked this steely blogger. But none of the references are overly gratuitous and are designed to be abhorrent to the reader rather than a form of entertainment. I have since read that the author, Larssen, had been emotionally affected by sexual violence against women after witnessing rape, and part of me finds it surprising that he would writew about such things with this amount of detail. Then again, with any type of trauma, confronting the issue is often the best way of dealing with it, so perhaps this was his way.

Violence aside, this is a highly readable book. The main character is a charming and likeable man, and there is something altogether appealing about Salander. The crime itself was intricate enough to keep the reader guessing up until the last, and left the characters wide open for further stories. An entertaining enough read, though perhaps not enough to sway me to other crime fiction novels.

Other blog reviews:
Gemini Moon
You Can Never Have Too Many Books

Gentlemen of the Road - Michael Chabon

Read for: A Tournament of Reading

Described as a 'swashbuckling adventure', this was hands down unlike anything I have ever read. Bought on a whim in a second hand bookshop purely because I loved the film adaptation of Michael Chabon's Wonder Boys. And because the blurb on the back of this book was unusual enough to pique my curiosity.

Although a very short novel, it took me a while to read. Most likely because the plot was something so very different from what I am used to, and also because of the language.

The titular Gentlemen are Amran and Zelikman, a mismatched duo of comrades travelling the road, living day to day, seemingly lacking any greater plan. That is until they meet the young Filaq, a displaced Khazar prince, and they join the rebellion to return him to the throne.

The language was quite frankly luscious. To begin with I almost felt as if I needed a dictionary and history book in order to understand the plot. But letting this book simply wash over me became the best option, and it was a truly enjoyable romp, whilst managing to also be an intelligent book with interesting characters.

I have now managed to get my hands on a copy of Wonder Boys and am thoroughly looking forward to reading it.

Other reviews:
A Fraternity of Dreamers

Shiver - Maggie Stiefvater

Grace has a fascination with wolves. Not just any wolves, but those that live in the woods behind her house. And one wolf in particular, a wolf with yellow eyes, who watches her just as she watches him. There is more to these wolves than meets the eye. Sam, a young yellow-eyed man, is torn between his two lives, but cannot bear to be separated from the girl who watches him.

This is a supernatural love story, a la Twilight, the love between a girl and a supernatural creature. A forbidden love. Nothing new there then.

While not a particularly original story however, there was a certain charm to this book. Stiefvater's descriptions of the wolves, cold winter and the woodlands were beautiful rather than overly romantic, and her portrayal of a strong heroine was worlds away from the passive Bella of Stephanie Meyer's Twilight. The reasoning, or perhaps even science, behind the werewolves' change was also a nice touch, but overall I found it hard to become emotionally involved in this story.

Definitely a book for fans of supernatural romance, though perhaps not as thrilling as I had hoped. I probably won't be reading the sequel.

Other blog reviews:
Book Gazing
Becky's Book Reviews
Gemini Moon
Fluttering Butterflies
Melody's Reading Corner
Medieval Bookworm

The Foreshadowing - Marcus Sedgwick

Another Marcus Sedgwick novel, and another fantastic read. I swear the man can do no wrong. The Foreshadowing is something else. I tend to be drawn more to children's fantasy than historical fiction, but that has changed since I've started reading Marcus Sedgwick's work, as he so often combines the two, together with great characters and powerful storytelling.

The Foreshadowing is the tale of Alexandra "Sasha" Fox, a young girl living in London during World War I. Like her brothers, Sasha wants to help, and while Edgar enlists as a soldier and Tom trains as a doctor, Sasha persuades her father to let her begin training as a nurse in his hospital. But Sasha has a secret, a 'gift' that she cannot explain and that her family have never accepted - she can see the future. But the only future that Sasha sees is death, which soon takes its toll after seeing premonitions of the deaths of several patients in her care.

After the guilt of remaining away from active service drives her beloved brother Tom to the front line, Sasha is tormented by recurring visions of his death. Fear of losing what remains of her family, Sasha travels to France, disguised as a fully trained nurse, in an attempt to find and save her brother from the fate in her visions. Along her journey to the Somme, Sasha befriends the mysterious Hoodoo Jack, a man also cursed with visions of the future, and finds her life becoming linked to his in a way she could not possibly expect.

Although painfully naive, Sasha's bravery and single-minded determination end up teaching her a lot about herself, and her gift - or curse. Her journey is an emotional one, full with the horrors and reality of war. Sedgwick has clearly done his research into life in the trenches, making Sasha's experiences all the more real. There is also the connection between Sasha and Cassandra, the legendary character doomed with the knowledge of the fate of Troy, yet cursed to have noone believe her. What can Sasha really do about her own fate, or that of her brother?

This is a wonderful story of love, hope, fear and determination. It is also a tale of destiny, how one shapes it and make it one's own. Beautifully written and powerfully real, the supernatural aspects never seem out of place. And the ending...well you'll have to read that for yourself.

Other links:
Marcus Sedgwick's website and blog.

Monsters of Men - Patrick Ness

Wow...third and final book in Patrick Ness's fabulous Chaos Walking series. I actually read this several months ago now, but it was so hard to write this review at the time and then life caught up with me.

I can't say too much without spoiling events that occur in this book. Todd and Viola are caught in the conflict between three warring armies, all converging on New Prentisstown, desperate for dominance, or freedom.

The narrative of this final book is what makes it stand out, with Todd, Viola and the Return each telling their own stories. Each character brings their own distinct voice, making the story a very personal one and giving it a powerful emotional impact.

Monsters of Men is devastating, showing the horrors of war, and the terrible choices of those caught up in it. Ness continues to shock and horrify me, at one point I found myself completely disbelieving the events he had written...how could he do that to the characters I had grown to care about! I can't believe this is the final book in the series, but look forward to reading more of Ness' work. Wonderful stuff.

1. The Knife of Never Letting Go
2. The Ask and the Answer
3. Monsters of Men

Other blog reviews:
Stuff as Dreams are Made on
Things mean a lot
Fluttering Butterflies
Stella Matutina
Medieval Bookworm
Gemini Moon

Autumn festivals, woodlands, cakes and birthdays

I love that my birthday is in autumn, my favourite season. Tis a season for long misty walks, harvesting veggies from the garden, foraging for fruits, roots and mushrooms, and baking delicious cakes. Tis also a season for music and celebrating the land, both of which were in abundance at this year's Rivenstone festival, held on the beautiful Dartmoor landscape.

Weaving looms with the land

An offering

Nigel Shaw and Carolyn Hillyer performing at Rivenstone

Early autumn walks in Foxley wood

Anticipation of autumn gathering

Autumn cakes made with Foxley blackberries!

An Italian Wedding

A few weeks ago I travelled to Italy to spend a week with friends and family for my sister's wedding. We spent the week in a gorgeous villa near the small town of San Gimignano in Tuscany, with lots of touristy events, wine tasting, horse riding and parties! My sister and her husband were married in the famous town hall in the ancient town of Volterra (by the mayor!). The weather was glorious most days, though sadly there was torrential rain on the wedding day. Luckily the sun came out just in time for my sister to arrive at the hall!

Volterra town hall

My sister arriving at the hall

After the wedding ceremony

The bridesmaids (I'm on the left)

My sister's lovely dress

Our villa near San Gimignano

View from the villa

RIP V Challenge

I'm a bit slow on joining this years Readers. Imbibing. Peril. Challenge, hosted as ever by the fabulous Carl of Stainless Steel Droppings. The challenge runs from 1st September to 31st October and involves reading books that fall into several categories:

Mystery
Suspense
Thriller
Dark Fantasy
Gothic
Horror
Supernatural

I will be participating in Peril the First, reading four books that fit into these categories.


My pool of potential reads include:
Dracula - Bram Stoker
The Hound of the Baskervilles - Sir Arthur Conan Doyle
Lonely Werewolf Girl - Martin Millar
The Invisible Ring - Anne Bishop
The Historian - Elizabeth Kostova
White Crow - Marcus Sedgewick
A Game of Thrones - George RR Martin

Also on my bookshelf:
An Instance of the Fingerpost - Ian Pears
The Girl Who Played With Fire - Stieg Larsson
The Collector - John Fowles
Fingersmith - Sarah Waters

For more information, take a look at Carl's challenge post, and above all enjoy reading!

Witch Hill - Marcus Sedgwick

Marcus Sedgwick seems to be one of the authors that I forget all about, and then I discover another of his books and fall for his writing all over again!

Jamie is haunted by the terrifying fire that broke out in his family home. Sent to stay with his aunt in Somerset, his respite is interrupted by the strange incidents that occur in the small village. First the evil old witch in his nightmares, and the ancient chalk carving uncovered on Crownhill, then a tale emerges of a seventeenth century witchhunt victim. The thing that connects them all...fire. Jamie is forced to face his worst fear and uncover the truth.

Witch Hill is a short but compelling tale. Sedgwick's skill is in the atmosphere and tension that he weaves and the emotions that he invokes. The description of Jamie's fears are heartbreakingly real, making his plight all the more moving. I particularly loved the references to the 'ancient' (depending on which history text you read!) chalk carvings and seventeeth century witch hunts.

Highly enjoyable.

Festival time

I've been away again...a lot! There's something about this year that has kept me ridiculously busy, but not that I haven't enjoyed it! Firstly, a fabulous weekend at Latitude festival, then a wonderful week in Tuscany, Italy for my little sister's wedding. Sadly in between I managed to gain a fractured finger during a karate session, which is still causing problems.

On to the festival fun though. What a great weekend! Latitude is such a chilled out festival in Suffolk, in some beautiful green fields surrounded by woodland and a lovely lake in the middle. The weather was glorious for the most past, and we had a great crowd of old and new friends. Musical highlights were Jonsi (yes he has indeed changed my life!), Angus and Julia Stone (with surprise guest, Damien Rice singing along to You're the one that i want from Grease) , Frank Turner, Rodrigo and Gabriela, James, Tankus the Henge (indescribable!) and Laura Marling. The most pleasant surprise (aside from Damien Rice of course!) was the delightful China Mieville, who read an extract from his new novel Kraken and was so excited to meet us marine biologists that we talked for quite some time about all things cephalopody...I may have fallen in love!

Who's coming with me next year? ;)

Latitude, complete with painted sheep

Julia Stone and surprise guest, Damien Rice

Rodrigo y Gabriela

The indescribable Jonsi

Enjoying the festivities

the fabulous China Mieville

Hilarious poet Joe Dunthorne

Phil Jupitus aka Porky the poet

Cherry on Top Award

Thank you so much to the lovely Cannwin and Jennifer of the Literary Soundtrack for giving me the Cherry on Top Award! That really made me smile :)

Here's how it works:

1. Thank the person who gave you the award.
2. Copy award and put it in your blog.
3. List three things that you love about yourself.

• My curly hair - its a nightmare sometimes, but I wouldn't change it!
• My home - it needs work and has created quite a headache over the 6 months since I bought it, but it's mine to make as I wish and I'm happy that I was brave (and lucky) enough to take the leap, and thankful for the help I have had.
• My experiences - although there are many things I still want to do and places I want to see, I am happy that I have done so much with my life already.

4. Post a photo that you love.
I took this picture of Dunottar Castle in Scotland back in 2006, and it has stayed with me as one of my favourite examples of what I love about Britain.

5. Tag 5 people you would like to pass this award on to.

• A Striped Armchair
• Fluttering Butterflies
• In Spring Is The Dawn
• Stuff As Dreams Are Made On
• Stella Matutina

Thanks you guys :)

The Vintner's Luck - Elizabeth Knox

"You fainted and I caught you. It was the first time I'd supported a human. You had such heavy bones. I put myself between you and gravity. Impossible."

This book had completely passed me by. I had never even heard of the author, and it was not until a friend returned from a year of travelling in South America, that a copy was placed in my hands, with the most heartfelt of recommendations. The cover of my copy (right) did not exactly inspire me, but once I read the first page, I was well and truly engrossed.

The Vintner's Luck is a tale of the divine. But it is also the most human tale I could possible imagine reading. Opening in a French vineyard in 1808, our story follows Sobran, a young man poised on the precipe of manhood, heartbroken at being refused permission to marry the woman he loved. Taking solace in the vineyard with freshly bottled wine, the young Sobran meets a creature who will change his life forever. This particular vintner's "luck" is an angel, one whom agrees to meet Sobran on the same day each year, throughout the man's lifetime. And thus begins the most electrifying, and heartbreaking of relationships.

I could not leave my bed yesterday until I had finished this wonderful novel. That often happens to me when I get gripped by a tale, especially one with such neat, short sections, where it is impossible not to move on to the next! Today I found myself flicking through the book again, savouring some of the more beautiful passages, reminding myself of events and characters that moved me. Xas is so beautifully described, curious about and becoming lost in a world he does not truly understand, and emotions he could not possibly expect. Sobran is so painfully human, capable of overwhelming emotion, and of making all too credible mistakes. And do not let us forget the women in this story, the passionate and possible insane Celeste, and the intelligent and courageous Aurora.

Writing this review, I have found it a struggle to put into words how I feel about this story, so I shall turn to one of my favourite bloggers, Memory, who puts it perfectly..." the book crashed into me...one of those stories that sneaks up on you. You're reading along, utterly convinced that the novel is beautiful without being moving, when suddenly you realize that it's now part of your life. It's in you, and it's going to be with you forever." Through Memory's review I have now discovered that there is a sequel, or rather a continuation of one character's story, and I shall certainly be hunting it down. And Knox it seems has several other novels available, though it is hard to imagine anything that could be more beautiful than this glorious tale.

The friendship between Xas and Sobran is incredibly moving. Though much of the tale describes the divine; referring throughout to God, Lucifer, heaven and hell, it is truly grounded in humanity. Following Sobran's mortal life, we get a glimpse of how it may appear to an immortal, while following the struggle of this one man, in his relationships, with his family, and with the ever-present vineyard itself. For do not forget, this is a tale of that wonderful delight...wine, which permeates even the annual meetings between the man and the angel.

Elizabeth Knox's writing is a joy to read. Simple, but elegant, her descriptions invoke images of the divine, while continually grounding them with all that is human. You can almost taste the wine, feel the gentle midsummer evening sun of your skin, smell the freshly crushed grapes, hear the flutter of feathered wings. There are so many passages I would like to quote, many of which could spoil events that occur, so I will leave you with these few...

"Sobran fell against a warm, firm pillow of muscle. He lay braced by a wing, pure sinew and bone under a cushion of feathers, complicated and accommodating against his side, hip, legs, the pinions split around his ankle. The angel was breathing steadily, and smelled of snow. Sobran's terror was so great that he was calm, a serenity like that a missionary priest had reported having felt when he found himself briefly in the jaws of a lion. There was an interval of warm silence; then Sobran saw that the moon was higher and felt that his pulse and the angel's were walking apace."

"I've learned too much abuout unhappiness. I have it now, a permanent condition, like deafness. When I go out and watch the creamy surf pour into the cove Ican't hear it - I'm not here to hear - or something is crushing the sense out of me all the time. I love you [...], but I'm not coming near you until I stop wanting to burn away this pain with pain."

"I hate the connective tissue in a story. I think of the time I've spend silent or speaking secretively and it seems impossible to me to describe even a short journey, for every step depends on other earlier steps and my whys and wherefores are as infinitesminal as atoms in the scent trails we leave in the air - negligible, not evidence, but there."

"He was exhausted, but love was never finished, it had its rights, it had the right of prophecy."

p.s. this title has now been made into a film.

Other blog reviews:
Stella Matutina
A Striped Armchair
Just Add Books

(have you reviewed this book?)