Leviathan Review
This is one of the most creative alternate histories I've read in a while, as well as one of the most innovative implementations of the genre known as steampunk. As soon as I heard of it, I was interested in reading it, and I would have purchased it if the bookstore that issued a steampunk coupon had been willing to honor it for its purchase. They refused because it was on the new books table rather than the steampunk table. It turned out just as well because a few days later I got the opportunity to select it through Amazon Vine.
Mr. Westerfeld has done a marvelous job of technology imagining and world building out of the Europe of 1914. The clankers, walking war machines, are clever creations, and the fabs, genetically engineered beasts, are astonishing! He has also created a pair of very engaging and likable teenage main characters: Aleksandar Ferdinand, son of the assassinated heir to the Austro-Hungarian Empire, on the run and being hunted by those who murdered his parents, and Deryn Sharp, daughter and sister of airmen, who is disguised as a boy (Dylan) in order to enlist in the British Air Service, which does not allow females. He has also created a couple of deliciously deceptive and questionably trustworthy secondary characters: Count Volger, Alek's arrogant and secretive fencing master and Dr. Nora Barlow, lady zookeeper and (deliberately?) annoying diplomat on a secret mission to Turkey. I look forward to seeing all four in further action in the sequels Behemoth and Goliath.
Defects? Nothing major, just a nitpick and a warning. The nitpick concerns criticism of First Sea Lord Winston Churchill's decision to seize a warship being built in Britain for Turkey because of fears that Turkey would end up on the other side in the coming war. In our world it was actually two battleships not a warship and a companion creature, and though some people at the time no doubt had similar criticisms of Churchill, with 20-20 hindsight his decision was unquestionably the correct one. The very day the ships were being seized, Turkey and Germany were signing a secret alliance. Allowing a secretly German-allied Turkey to take possession of two brand new super dreadnoughts would have been a terrible mistake; allowing a presumably also secretly German-allied Turkey to take possession of what is described as "among the most advanced (warships) in the world, with a companion creature strong enough to change the balance of power on the seas" would have been an absolute catastrophe, and in light of this I'm frankly rather dubious about the wisdom of Dr. Barlow's secret mission to Turkey.
As this shows, one of the risks in writing alternate history as opposed to building your own world is getting called on things you haven't explicitly changed, but there is another much more serious potential problem. Naomi Novik recently had a brilliant idea: Napoleonic warfare... with dragons, Anne McCaffrey meets Patrick O'Brian: His Majesty's Dragon, Throne of Jade, Black Powder War, Empire of Ivory, Victory of Eagles, and Tongues of Serpents. The trouble was that having imagined something this history altering, Ms. Novik proceeded to alter European history with it not one bit. Not only had the preceding centuries of European history with dragons unfolded almost exactly the same as it had in our world, but now the battles and campaigns of the Napoleonic wars were unfolding in almost exactly the same way, too. Ms. Novik belatedly tossed in some (poorly thought out IMHO) history alterations outside of Europe itself, but by then the damage had been done, and her premise had become too ridiculous for I and a number of former fans to accept any longer. I can only hope that Mr. Westerfeld instead heeds the advice a certain Corsican MIGHT have given him:
"When you set out to alter history, alter history."
I for one will be greatly disappointed if Mr. Westerfeld has his Clankers and Darwinists duplicate every diplomatic and military folly of our history and fight it out through four years of grinding trench warfare!
Leviathan Feature
Leviathan Overview
It is the cusp of World War I, and all the European powers are arming up. The Austro-Hungarians and Germans have their Clankers, steam-driven iron machines loaded with guns and ammunition. The British Darwinists employ fabricated animals as their weaponry. Their
Leviathan is a whale airship, and the most masterful beast in the British fleet.
Aleksandar Ferdinand, prince of the Austro-Hungarian Empire, is on the run. His own people have turned on him. His title is worthless. All he has is a battle-torn Stormwalker and a loyal crew of men.
Deryn Sharp is a commoner, a girl disguised as a boy in the British Air Service. She's a brilliant airman. But her secret is in constant danger of being discovered.
With the Great War brewing, Alek's and Deryn's paths cross in the most unexpected way...taking them both aboard the Leviathan on a fantastical, around-the-world adventure. One that will change both their lives forever.
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