strange and random happenstance: O.M. Grey

While I have covered some of my favorite Steampunk authors, they are by no means the only Steampunk authors! This is a genre that is expanding and evolving every day. Like the great YA leap, when authors where trying to finagle their way into that genre, authors are trying to find ways to market to this burgeoning demographic all the time. In fact, my reading list for this summer did overflow with Steampunk books I longed to read and finally get around to. What with that pesky thing called "life" I was unable to even finish much of my list, restricting my reading to just the authors that participated this summer.

I hope that this summer has found a new genre or a new favorite book for you. Perhaps I will do this again next summer with even more authors, what do you say to that? Until then, remember to enter the giveaway, ending Sunday night, and here's some more books to check out, again, these are just books I found interesting, but the list isn't really that accurate or exhaustive a list. Also, I'd love to hear your recommendations too!

Shelley Adina: Lady of Devices, Her Own Devices and Magnificent Devices

Paolo Bacigalupi: The Windup Girl

Jonathan Barnes: The Somnambulist

Cage Baker: The Women of Nell Gwynne's

Frank Beddor: The Looking Glass Wars, Seeing Red and ArchEnemy

Meljean Brook: The Iron Duke, Heart of Steel and Riveted

G.K. Chesterton: The Man Who Was Thursday

Cassandra Clare: Clockwork Angel, Clockwork Prince and Clockwork Princess

Kady Cross: The Girl in the Steel Corset and The Girl in the Clockwork Collar

Gordon Dahlquist: The Glass Books of the Dream Eaters, The Dark Volume and The Chemickal Marriage

Glenn Dakin: The Society of Unrelenting Vigilance and The Society of Dread

Bonnie Dee: Like Clockwork

Kate Elliott: Cold Magic, Cold Fire and Cold Steel

Phil and Kaja Foglio: Girl Genius Comics, Agatha H. and the Airship City and Agatha H. and the Clockwork Princess

O.M. Grey: Avalon Revisited
Clay and Susan Griffith: The Greyfriar, The Rift Walker and The King Makers

M.K. Hosbon: Native Star, Hidden Goddess and The Warlock's Curse

Mark Hodder: The Strange Affair of Spring Heeled Jack, The Curious Case of the Clockwork Man and Expedition to the Mountains of the Moon

Stehphen Hunt: The Court of the Air, The Kingdom Beyond the Waves, The Rise of the Iron Moon, Secrets of the Fire Sea, Jack Cloudie and From the Deep of the Dark

Matthew J. Kirby: The Clockwork Three

Suzanne Lazear: Innocent Darkness

Karin Lowachee: The Gaslight Dogs

Scott Lynch: The Lies of Lock Lamora and Red Seas Under Red Skies

Richard Matheson: I Am Legend

Andrew P. Mayer: The Falling Machine, Hearts of Smoke and Steam and Power Under Pressure

China Miéville: Un Lun Dun

Tim Powers: The Anubis Gates

Christopher Priest: The Prestige

Félix J. Palma: The Map of Time and The Map of the Sky

S.M. Peters: Whitechapel Gods

Philip Pullman: The Shadow in the North, The Golden Compass, The Subtle Knife and The Amber Spyglass

Lilith Saintcrow: The Iron Wyrm Affair

Mary Shelley: Frankenstein

Jacques Tardi: Adele Blanc-Sec Comics

Tiffany Trent: The Unnaturalists

Scott Westerfeld: Leviathan, Behemoth and Goliath

Yseabeau S. Wilce: Flora Segunda, Flora's Dare and Flora's Fury

Also, further Steampunky goodness from this summer's authors:

Gail Carriger: 2013 will see some more Gail with Etiquette and Espionage, the first book in The Finishing School series, and Prudence, the first book in The Parasol Protectorate Abroad series

George Mann: The Osiris Ritual, The Immorality Engine, Ghosts of Manhattan and Ghosts of War

Cherie Priest: Clementine, Dreadnought, Ganymede and shortly, The Inexplicables

Posted by Miss Eliza at 12:00 AM 2 comments

Labels: Cherie Priest, Frankenstein, Gail Carriger, George Mann, Giveaway, Jacques Tardi, O.M. Grey, Philip Pullman, Scott Westerfeld, Steampunk Summer

Ministry of Peculiar Occurrences: Tales from the Archives by Pip Ballantine, Tee Morris et al.
Published by: ImagineThat! Studios
Publication Date: August 23rd, 2011-June 17th, 2012
Format: Kindle
Rating: ★★★
To Buy Collection 1
To Buy Collection 2
To Buy Collection 3
To Buy Collection 4

Pip Ballantine and Tee Morris have been more willing than most authors to embrace the possibilities of new media. Not surprising when you look at their bios and realize how much they have done with podcasts, facebook, twitter, all of which Tee has spoken on. So short e-pub stories don't seem much of a stretch. Yet most authors don't bother to embrace something that could so easily get you new readers and make the returning ones giggle with glee. To find that in the dark hours while you are desperately waiting for the next installment of your favorite new book series that there's a short story to tide you over is a wondrous discovery. The world of The Ministry of Peculiar Occurrences also lends itself to this expansion of its universe. While there are Books and Braun, who we love dearly, there are not only peripheral characters to be explored, but also characters that have never been mentioned. The Ministry is a world wide organization that has been around for quite a few years, their archives are easily full to bursting with stories to tell. Telling some of the stories themselves, or relying on other authors, the world that Pip and Tee have created is becoming more and more rich.

At last count there are sixteen short stories set within their world. You can buy them individually or in collections of four for your reading pleasure. As with any collection of stories written by a variety of authors, the quality varies from some of the best short stories I have ever read to ones that I just desperately wanted to end. Yet, they do a very good job of showing the scope of The Ministry's power, as they take place from South America to New Zealand, India to remotest Africa, Siam to the American West, and scary houses just over the road in Islington. We get old questions answered, like why did Eliza really leave New Zealand, what happened on the river in Paris between her and Harry, how hard was it to get all those seven vases that lead to El Dorado, before Eliza broke the last one, to how bad is the situation between Books and his father. We get back stories and side stories and the Ministry Seven, the Ministry's own Baker Street Irregulars, before they where the Ministry Seven. Tons of new questions to have answered, that one can only hope for in an upcoming tale.

The first collection seems to be centered on all the evil jewels can bring. You never want to get a cursed ruby or bauble... bad luck will surely befall you! While the second collection seems to be more action, adventure, daring-do, with men being men in far off places and saving the world for Queen and Country! Rider Haggard, eat your heart out! The third collection contains my very favorite stories of all. Some of the best ones I've read. If you have a desire to read some of the best spine tingling stories, this is where to find them. Collection four is a hodgepodge of stories that didn't really catch me due to tropes of Terracotta Warriors and masturbatory jokes that seemed to key into this year's movie Hysteria. I just think the jokes fell flat and I felt sorry for Books.

Yet of all these stories, there are two that I must single out as being sheer perfection. The first is Dust on the Davenport by O.M. Grey and the second is Hanuman's Gift by Helen E. H. Madden. It does not surprise me that Dust on the Davenport won the Steampunk Chronicle Reader’s Choice Award for Best Short Story. This little ghost story about a junior agent investigating what the other agents think is just another haunting false alarm starts out as a sweet little story about a grieving widow leaning on a green agent and slowly evolves into full on heebie-jeebies land. I don't think I've had this much spine tingling since the first time I watched The Legend of Hell House, which still gives me nightmares! Pure Victorian Ghost Story perfection! While I think Hanuman's Gift will easily be a contender for this year's Reader's Choice Award. Told by Eliza's old partner Harry to the sceptical and inept archivist before Books, it shows the horrors that face agents out in the field and that local myths and legends might best be followed or you could get some zombie monkey action going on that has overtones of Neil Gaiman's Coraline. Also, we learn a lesson that is best repeated, be careful what you wish for! World peace might mean a world devoid of humanity and spending you days relaxing in your pajamas, might just indicate Bedlam.

I look forward to more of the promised stories. I'll need them if I'm to be patient till the next book comes out!