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Summary
Summary
"It is 1849. James Cobham, young man about London, has tragically drowned in a boating accident. Or has he? Two months after his disappearance, his cousin receives a letter. James is in hiding, with no memory of the last two months. His cousin responds that he probably ought to continue in hiding, and the adventures begin." "Told through letters, diaries, and real contemporary documents, this unique novel by two of today's freshest and most popular fantasists leads the reader through every corner of mid-nineteenth-century Britain, from the parlors of the elite to the dens of the underclass. Not since Wilkie Collins or Conan Doyle has there been such a profusion of guns, swordfights, family intrigues, women disguised as men, secret societies, occult pursuits, philosophical discussions, and passionate romance. And not since the historical romps of George MacDonald Fraser has there been such a complex, satisfying array of historical characters and startling events."--BOOK JACKET.Title Summary field provided by Blackwell North America, Inc. All Rights Reserved
Author Notes
Steven Karl Zoltan Brust is a writer and musician. He was born on November 23, 1955.
Brust has worked as a systems programmer for a computer company and played guitar, drums, and banjo in such bands as Cats Laughing, Morrigan, and Boiled in Lead.
Brust writes science fiction, including the Vlad Taltos series, The Pheonix Guards, 500 Years After, and Brokedown Palace. He has written "choose-your-own-adventure" books for Tor and published several short stories in a series. Brust also released a solo album, A Rose for Iconoclastes, on the SteelDragon label.
(Bowker Author Biography)
Reviews (4)
Publisher's Weekly Review
Top-tier fantasists Brust (Five Hundred Years After) and Bull (War for the Oaks) team up for a historical romance, expertly styled after a 19th-century English epistolary novel, that runs one James Cobham through the gauntlets of three sinister conspiracies. For all the novel's philosophizing (Hegel and Feuerbach are much discussed), it is at heart a romantic mystery-adventure that alternates bloody fights and breathless chases with drawing-room chat. Presumed drowned for much of the book, James must track down his would-be assassins or enemies-including a devil-worshipping cult, a family squabbling over ownership of an ancient estate and forces interested in the pacification of the English proletariat (both Engels and Marx show up at one time or another). First through the assistance of his cousin Richard, later with the help of his witty, spirited cousin Susan, with whom he falls in love, James must make his way through a web of intrigue that stretches across all of England. A clever and horrific twist caps off this intelligent tale, which features engaging characters and surprises that, for all their thrills, stem quite naturally from the groundwork the authors have so cleverly laid. (Mar.) (c) Copyright PWxyz, LLC. All rights reserved
Kirkus Review
Victorian sleuthing, though billed as fantasy, from Brust (Five Hundred Years Later, 1994, etc.) and Bull (Finder, 1994). The story of James Cobham, Chartist, revolutionary, and confidant of Friedrich Engels, one of the founders of Communism, emerges through a series of letters and journal entries. In 1849, Cobham finds himself at an inn near Portsmouth, having supposedly perished in a boating accident two months before; he has no memory of the interval, though he bears suggestive scars and injuries. He then writes to his brother, at their ancestral Melrose Hall, where Cobham's independently wealthy cousin and bold amateur detective, Susan Voight, determines to discover why someone tried to murder him and why he was held capture and deprived of his memory. Some of the answers lie in Cobham's past activities as a daring revolutionary, as Susan's sleuthing and his own returning recollections attest. Behind all the strange goings-on is a bunch of sinister occultists allied with rich foreign power-brokers, whose objectives are to disinherit Cobham in favor of old rival Alan Tournier, and to discredit the entire revolutionary movement by manipulating Cobham. Very difficult to approach, top-heavy with philosophizing, and not particularly rewarding--although characterizing it as a humdrum Victorian adventure is, ironically enough, some measure of the author's success.
Booklist Review
Brust and Bull's historical fantasy-mystery recalls George Macdonald Fraser's Flashman adventures in the creative use of a rich historical background and also echoes the pioneering Victorian mysteries of Wilkie Collins in offering the reader a convoluted puzzle. It begins with the apparent demise of a fashionable young Englishman in a boating accident, then gathers speed as the deceased's cousin receives a letter from him. Thereafter, it rapidly becomes an exceptional page-turner, full of plots, counterplots, and chases; a mass of Victorian virtues, vices, and settings; and an array of material and magical weapons worthy of a technothriller. Even its erotic scenes are excellent and appropriate, and while it does demand some historical literacy about nineteenth-century Europe, those demands probably will not daunt most of the current fantasy audience. Brust and Bull's superior work is a credit to both of them and deserves a place in every self-respecting fantasy collection. --Roland Green
Library Journal Review
Where can you read about Marx, Engels, and Napoleon Bonaparte, plus numerous other historic characters in one book? In this new fantasy novel by Brust (Agyar, LJ 2/15/94) and Bull (Finder, LJ 2/15/93), that's where. Although the body of James Cobham has not been found, he is assumed to have drowned in an accident in 1849. Two months after the accident, his cousin, Richard, receives a letter from James annoucing that he is alive and in hiding, but he can't recall the past two months. Richard writes back, advising James to stay in hiding because he suspects foul play. The correspondence unfolds among several characters and reveals James's mysterious past. Resembling the works of Tolstoy and Dickens in the plethora of characters, Stoker in the and Mary Shelly in the presented exposition, the novel brings together intrigue, adventure, politics, and magic in a complex epic that astonishes the reader. Although the format is occasionally cumbersome, the story is interesting enough to keep the reader turning pages. Recommended for libraries with strong sf/fantasy collections.Georgia Panos, Johnson Cty. Lib. System, Leawood, Kan. (c) Copyright 2010. Library Journals LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.