"Soulless" by Gail Carriger

Book:        Soulless

Author:      Gail Carriger

ISBN:          0316056634

Publisher:   Orbit

Rating:       Four Stars

Dirigibles, steam-driven mechanical contraptions, automatons, vampires and the like aboundin Carriger's "steampunk-lite" romance smorgasborg, chronicling the tale of a "soulless" preternatural, Alexia Tarabotti, and an alpha wolf, Conall Maccon, Earl of Woolsey in Victorian London as they try to unravel a sinister mystery.

Throw in the help of the bureau of Unnatural Registry (BUR), the queen's Shadow Council, a truculent beta wolf, and one lavender-clad popinjay (entourage in tow), shenanigans roar out of control, threatening the Crown, and the fragile human/supernatural social structure.

Carriger's realm smacks of fresh originality, her characters drawn with precision: the harridan mother, Mrs. Loontwill, Lord Akeldama, Professor Lyall, Floote (the butler), and hunky Conall are all memorable and quirky. It was a veritable feast to dig into Carriger's novel!

Soulless distinctly reminds one of Kim Newman's original Victorian vampire series, (Anno Dracula, The Bloody Red Baron, and Judgment of Tears) and his stalwart character Kate Reed meshed with Emile Gaboriau's creation of French detective Monsieur Lecoq. But Carriger has a fresher, softer take in her Victorian vision. Her spinsterish brolly-wielding protagonist will have you on the floor laughing page after page and curling your toes as she and Conall reluctantly try to fight off their magnetic attraction to one another (and of course fail miserably!).

March 2010 cannot come soon enough when "Changeless" the second book in the series is out!

A Fiendishly Bookish Review