Darwinist Vs Clankers

If this rambling is even more rambly and incoherent then normal, just blame it on the 36 straight hours I just worked...I'm gonna blame a lot of things on that :-).  I did however find time to finish a couple of books, so lets ramble shall we.  Today I will ramble about Goliath by Scott Westerfeld, the last book in the Leviathan trilogy.  This conclusion to our steampunk/alternate history series packed in a lot of stuff so lets get right to it.  As always SPOILERS AHEAD!

When we left our exiled Austrian Prince Alek and his friend midshipman Dylan Sharp (who is really a girl disguised as a boy by the name of Deryn) they had just gotten back on the Leviathan after helping with the Ottoman revolution.  They are now flying their big beastie across the world on a secret mission.  They end up in Siberia rescuing a Serb scientist and his guards.  The man turns out to be Nikola Tesla, the man behind the Tesla cannons from the last book.  He is convinced that the mass destruction of the Siberian forest they were rescued from was from his new mega weapon that he has dubbed Goliath.  Tesla convinces Alek that just the mere threat of a weapon that can completely destroy a city should end the war.  Alek (who still feels it's his destiny to end the war) decides to back Tesla and the captain of the Leviathan is instructed to assist him.  Along the way Alek (with the help of his perspicacious loris Borvil) finally discovers that Dylan is actually the girl Deryn.  After a bit of a falling out the two reconcile and agree to never have secrets again.  The Leviathan and crew head to America via Japan to bring Tesla back to his Goliath.  While in Japan, Deryn and Alek get to
experience a culture where both fabricated beasties and steam powered machines co-exist in a peaceful harmony.  The Leviathan ends up in California where they are greeted by William Randolph Hearst, a newspaper man with Clanker leanings.  We learn that America is another country that has both Clanker and Darwinist factions, but unlike Japan, they are frequently at odds with one another.  Hearst sabotages the Leviathan so that they end up crippled in Mexico.  Pancho Villa, the Mexican leader of a rebel group helps repair it...along with filming it.  Along the way Deryn get's hurt and the obnoxious reporter Eddie Malone discovers she is a girl and intends to reveal it in print when they arrive in New York.  Alek and Deryn discuss the future and how they are sad that they will part ways in New York, Alek staying behind to help Tesla and Deryn either continuing with the Leviathan or being punished for her deception.  Alek disembarks and after surviving an attack by the Clankers, convinces Eddie Malone to write about him being the heir to the throne instead of Deryn.  Alek and his company go with Tesla to perform a test/demonstration of the Goliath to the world to try and prove the vast strength of the weapon and hopefully get the world to end the war.  Aboard the Leviahan Deryn discovers that the Clankers are going to send a weapon machine to destroy Goliath.  Deryn convinces the captain to go back and defend Alek and company.  All sorts of chaos and action occurs and Tesla decides that he needs to actually destroy Berlin to prove his point.  Alek decides that he cannot justify the destruction of a city, along with the loss of countless lives, even if it does stop the war.  He and Tesla tussle and Tesla ends up electrocuted.  The Goliath essentially self destructs and a major disaster is averted. America finally enters the war, based on the Clanker attack on home soil.   Deryn finally gets through to Alek that he and his parents are not responsible for the war.  Alek decides to not become "king" of Austria, instead working with Deryn to help as many people as he can.  We end with our intrepid duo planning their next adventure and the fate of the world still undecided.

This book was very very full of everything.  We went all over the world, were introduced to a ton of people, saw beasties and machines everywhere, whew!  Overall I felt this book lacked a bit of focus that the first two had, but I could understand the author was trying to finish everything up as plausibly as possible, which I appreciate.  The author was also trying to impart a bit of flavor from everywhere, showing us how complicated the real WWI era was.  I appreciated the thought, but personally found it a bit excessive.  I could have done without the Poncho Villa part, and he could have probably skipped the California part as well, both parts were well written and added some flavor, but over all

felt a bit excessive.  I also wanted the perspicacious loris's to play a bit of a bigger part as they had been built up so much in the previous books.  I thoroughly enjoyed the crews stop in Japan, it was cool to see a place where technology, science, and life melded so well together, the author once again made a a place I am dying to visit.  Deryn continues to make me happy, she is really a great character, and the author does a great job avoiding some of the triteness of the whole girl dressed as a guy scenerio.  I liked how the "romance" between Deryn and Alek played out.  Deryn has had time to come to grips with her feelings and instead of making hopeless advances, accepts how life is and is content to be Alek's friend.  After the discover of Deryn's girlness, Alek goes through a couple of very realistic reactions, culminating in the two of them valuing their friendship as too important to ruin.  The eventual morphing of the friendship into romance is natural, realistic, an did not make me want to throw things which is awesome.  I liked the open ended conclusion as well, with America entering the war, but no actual resolution to it, just the hope that it will end sooner rather then later. The illustrations as always add just the right feel and very much compliment the series.  Over all this was my least favorite book in the trilogy, but it was still awesome.  The trilogy as a whole feels complete and the world the author created is wonderful and whole.  This is one of those series that has me running to my books and internets to research the real version of this alternate history making the idea of the book last even longer hurrah!  I give the book 6 out of 10 recording frogs and the series as a whole 7 out of 10 fighting bears and recommend it to anybody who likes steampunk, science, alternate history, history, good writing and excellent world building.  Happy Reading Everybody!
Are you a Darwinist or a Clanker?  What era would you like to see an alternate history set in?  Is my writing more or less coherent on no sleep?

That Is One Big Monster

Hello everybody, I hope you are all staying warm and cozy during this cold snap.  Please stay safe and have plenty of books to read when the electricity goes out.  Speaking of electricity I finished the book Behemoth, which is the second book in Scott Westerfeld's, Leviathan series set in an alternate WWI era.  Ok so maybe the two don't have a whole lot to do with each other, but I never said segues were my specialty.  I finished this book on my epic road trip of reading and craziness and am now ready to ramble on about it.  As always SPOILERS AHEAD!

We start our story a little while after the first book ends. We find our Austrian Prince in hiding Alek attempting to teach his British friend Midshipman Dylan (really a girl named Deryn in disguise) to fence aboard the now hybrid air ship Leviathan.  They soon get into a fight with two German sea ships called ironclads who decide to show off their new weapon, the Tesla Tower, which is essentially a super cool lightning tower!  The Leviathan is disabled, but is able to limp to the Ottoman Empire who at this point is still supposedly neutral in the coming conflict.  At this point we learn that the Sultan of the Ottoman Empire had commissioned Britain to fabricate (I love that term) a ship an its companion creature called the

Osman and Behemoth respectively. Both were produced and both were spectacular and both were kept by the British Empire to help them with the upcoming war.  The government told the Sultan that they were merely "borrowing" them and that they would be given over after the conflict was resolved.  This obviously makes for shaky ground for any British ship landing on Ottoman soil.  News finally gets out about the missing Prince and Alek and his men decide their best bet would be to make a run for it rather then become political prisoners of Britain. Alek is watching the weird eggs that made an appearance in the last book and one hatches right before he tries to escape.  The creature that emerges is a small monkey type creature that can produce incredible sounds.  It keeps screaming until Alek takes it with him, later learning the creature has imprinted on him.  Alek makes good his escape with a few of his men. Deryn goes with Dr. Barlow to present one of the eggs to the Sultan and try and mend the fences as it were.  When they get there it is apparent that the Germans have already made there move and are allied with the Sultan in all but official tidings. The egg is crushed and to prevent the Sultan from making Leviathan  leave, she tells him that they are offering it in place of the Osman.  This gives the Leviathan a few more days in dock to decide what to do about the iron clads with the dreaded Tesla cannons. Alek has met a man named Zaven, his daughter Lilit and Nene, Zaven's mother and the leader of the revolutionists.  The group is trying to figure out how to overthrow the Sultan using the various walkers that guard the different parts of the
city and are under control of the citizens.  The problem being that they are not allowed to be armed and are therefor no match for any of the big mechanical s that the army uses.   Meanwhile Deryn has been given a mission to plant carnivorous metal eating barnacles to massive nets strung across the channel that prevents the Darwinists from using any of their big sea monsters.   Her team is caught while she is underwater (using the coolest, weirdest, ookiest wetsuit ever) and she must find a way to escape.  She swims across the channel into what seems to be a ship yard and is nearly run over by the Orient Express, here complete with a steaming Dragon engine.  She makes good her escape and eventually hooks up with Alek who has found himself some friends in Istanbul.  Deryn makes the suggestion that they use "spice bombs", essentially bags of eye watering spices that can be lobbed into the mechanicals of the opposing side. Being the DIL of a pepper farmer I can tell you that this is quit effective.  The team goes into action, with a kind of twisted yet hilarious love triangle happening, probably the best use of the dreaded love triangle ever!  Seriously go read it, it's funny.  Alek convinces Deryn that by helping the revolution, they are also helping the Leviathan by destroying the Tesla towers to that it can lead the Behemoth in to destroy the iron clads which helps the revolution and may prevent the Ottoman Empire from going to war on either side.  All goes pretty much according to plan, the mech walkers destroy the Tesla towers, the nets dissolve and allow the airships to guide the Behemoth through the channel into the harbor to destroy the iron clads.  Unfortunatly Zaven is killed and one of Alek's men is injured.  Deryn convinces Alek to bring his men aboard the Leviathen and continue his quest to stop the war from there.  The whole ship now knows that Alek is the lost prince and actually treat him with honor and respect.
 The book ends there with the promise of heading to the Far East in the conclusion of the trilogy.

I have to say I really enjoyed this book.  In general I like the Darwinist/beasties side of this world better, but seeing the Clanker/mech side portrayed through the Ottoman Empire definitely gave it some real flavor.  I liked the setting for this book (the author actually went to Istanbul to get an authentic take on it, which I think really came through).  So often we think of WWI being a strictly European conflict, forgetting that the lines of countries and relationships were much different then.  The characters as always are great, I have come to seriously love Dylan/Deryn.  Her practicality and scratchiness (I don't know how else to put it) crack me up all the time.  I thought that the plot was a bit more exciting in this book then the first one, but I did miss some of the beasties (though there was still plenty), I guess since the first book had so much Darwinist stuff, it was only fair to put in more Clanker stuff this book...at least the author did it with flair.  I like how the author

treated his requisite love triangle.  We know from the last book that Deryn is probably in love with Alek, who has no idea that s/he is a girl and just really likes him as a friend he was never allowed to have growing up.  Enter Lilit who instantly causes Deryn to be jealous of her assumed love of Alek...until Alek informs Dylan that Lilit is really in love with him (who is really a her).  At the end Lilit implies that she knows that Dylan is actually a Deryn before whisking away to continue her fathers revolution.  The alternate history is always fun, with enough truth to make it recognizable, and enough fiction to make it enjoyable.  I find this to be less of a steampunk series and more of a alternate history series...which may be what steampunk is, but that is for another post.  The beastie that hatched from the egg is interesting with its ability to perceive much more then most humans, and it's unsettling way of conveying information.  I think that this little guy will possibly play a bigger part in the last book.  I am looking forward to see how this series finishes up and recommend this book at least as much as the first.  Oh yeah and it has the same awesome illustrator Keith Thompson as the last book.  I give this book 7 out of 10 beasties.
What kind of fabrication do you prefer mech or beastie?  Do you like alternate histories or do the inaccuracies drive you crazy?  Do I take way to much glee in twisted triangles?