Book Review: Boneshaker

Author: Cherie Priest

Boneshaker has been high on my TBR (to be read) list ever since I first heard about and saw the awesome cover art by Jon Foster. On the day it arrived in bookstores I ran out after work and snatched the last copy in the store. This is the first novel I have read by Cherie Priest, even though I still have Fathom sitting near the top of one of my book stacks. I heard someone describe this novel as a Steampunk meets The Night of the Living Dead and this a pretty apt description.

One aspect to Steampunk is take history and change certain aspects. The neat thing about Boneshaker is that it is set America, instead of England, and since I am somewhat of history buff I was able to recognize some of the differences. The year is 1880 and the Civil War has been raging for 18 years. England has entered the side of Confederacy and this caused the additional time. I am curious what to Abe Lincoln?

Summary

The novel takes place in Seattle, WA, which has not been admitted in the United States and is still run by local governments. Ms. Priest does a wise thing in her Author’s Notes chapter in explaining all the changes she made to Seattle before she got flooded with a tom of emails. Her Seattle has a larger population and many of the landmarks were built much earlier in her timeline.

The story centers on Briar Wilkes and her son, Ezekiel. Briar is infamous in Seattle as the widow of Dr. Leviticus Blue. Dr. Blue was an inventor who won a contract from the Russians to build a digging known as the Boneshaker. When he made his first test run with the machine it caused disastrous results to the city. The Boneshaker caused the collapse of several banks killing many people and unleashing a gas known as the Blight. The citizens soon discovered that exposure to the Blight essentially turns them in zombies. In response to the disaster the inner city is walled off from the outskirts in order contain the Blight gas.

To add to Briar’s misery, she is also the daughter of Maynard Wilkes. Maynard is considered to legend in some circles and a tyrant in other circles. Needless to say, Briar and Ezekiel are ostracized from society.

Fast forward sixteen years, Ezekiel is a rebellious young man who decides to take a quick trip into inner Seattle to find evidence in order to clear his family name. Only a couple of problems, most of Seattle is infested with hungry zombies and the small areas that are controlled by live people is governed by a crazy scientist, Dr. Minnericht. Of course, when Briar discovers that her son has gone exploring inside Seattle, she also makes her way into the city looking for him. For this point forward the story is a harrowing adventure of exploring the underbelly of a dilapidated city while running from the zombies.

Review

This was not the story I expected when I first saw this book. First and foremost is about survival and secondly it is about family. The Seattle that Ms. Priest created felt like a real place instead of just a prop. She slowly painted the picture of her city as the story moved along creating a fully realized three dimensional place. The constant tension felt by the group of people still living in the city is caused by the ever present threat of a zombie attack combine with the control exerted upon them by Dr. Minnericht. Again, Ms. Priest does an excellent job of portraying desperate people living in desperate times and have learned to cherish the small things in life. The atmosphere created in her novel is incredible and by far the strength of it.

The only real weakness of the novel is the characters are not fully developed. The main characters seem alittle two dimensional and I wish there was more focus in developing both Briar and Ezekiel. If I had felt more compassion towards these characters then easily would have one of the best novels of the years.

Last Word

Overall this was a great book and highly enjoyable. I understand there is two planned sequels but neither will take place in the same city or possibly involve the same characters. Which is a shame because this the type of story that deserves to continue to live on in future volumes. 

                                                           My Rating