Nov 09 2009
{book review} gail carriger: soulless (the parasol protectorate, book 1)
As I may have mentioned, I’m on something of a campaign to find and publicize vampire books that don’t suck (and yes, you can expect to see almost everything on that list coming up for review here–eventually), largely because the Twilight fad is driving me crazy and the few people who actually can write good vampire lit aren’t getting nearly as much attention as they deserve. (And yes, I will have an actual review of Twilight itself up at some point. I did, actually, had something all ready to post, and then it got eaten.) I haven’t actually read all that many yet, as the above-linked list might indicate: most of the books either have vampires as part of the worldbuilding without focusing the story on them, or they’re part of a much longer series, or both…or they don’t get my wholehearted recommendation, for one reason or another. In fact I think there are only four books on that list that I could offer to a Twilight fan and say, without any qualifiers, “You want good vampire lit? Try this.” (Those books, for anyone interested, are Sunshine, Those Who Hunt the Night, Traveling with the Dead, and Backup, and the last one is only partly a standalone.)
That’s just a very long way of saying that I’ve been hunting for more good vampire books, and in fact my list of books to read is considerably longer than that of books I have read; and that in my search, some months ago, I came across Gail Carriger’s yet-to-be-published Soulless. I like steampunk anyway, but the combination of the awesome cover and the plot description made me practically salivate. An alternate-history Victorian-steampunk London where werewolves and vampires are an integrated part of history and society? YES PLEASE. Glancing around Gail Carriger’s website and blog made me even more eager to read her book, just because she seemed like such an awesome person.
Well, Soulless was good and I’m looking forward to Changeless, the next book in the series, in large part because Gail Carriger’s worldbuilding is fantastic, but…well, I’ll just say it didn’t quite live up to my hopes. The worldbuilding definitely goes into the plus column, working supernatural beings into society in a way I’ve never seen an urban fantasy do before, and I’m eager to see a number of the characters again, especially Conall Maccon and Prof. Lyall (both werewolves, incidentally). There’s also a good deal of bickering between Alexia and Maccon that’s fun to read.
I did find the romance-novel content a bit of a surprise–I wouldn’t call it adult content per se, because it never gets quite explicit, but there’s still a lot more of the making out and the removing of clothes and such than I had any indication there would be, to the point that I’d almost be inclined to shelve it under paranormal romance rather than general urban fantasy, so that was a little odd. To a certain extent, the romantic elements almost pushed aside more important things like plot and, you know, imminent peril to life and limb (this actually happened more than once).
Bigger issues, though: Alexia is, I think, a strong enough character to carry this series, but she’s somehow both presented as such and also not allowed to be. We’re told far more than shown what she’s like and how strong-minded, contrary, willful, etc. she is, something that isn’t done anywhere near as much with the other characters–and they manage to stand on their own much better. (It might help, too, if the point-of-view were more consistent and if Alexia were always referred to as such within her own POV; switching between that and “Miss Tarabotti” for no apparent reason was a little weird too.) Much of the dialogue is the same way, in that we’re told that a character was confused or whatever when it’s already obvious from what the character said, or a speech tag is used in something of a self-conscious way that jars you just a bit, reminding you that there’s An Author writing here (”‘Manners!’ Alexia instructed”, said while she’s fending off an attack from a rogue vampire, I might add). Her characterization is a little patchy anyway, given that she’s willing to go against society and its conventions in certain respects (being a spinster, hooking up with another character, going out unchaperoned) but completely tied to said society in others (she’s mortified when her hair or clothes get messed up, despite extenuating circumstances like, I don’t know, fighting for her life, and she doesn’t consider that maybe she’d get on better with less restricting and therefore less fashionable clothes).
Other elements feel a little affected in the same way, trying for biting wit or Victorian sensibilities and not quite getting there (again, is the heroine truly going to be embarrassed by the state of her hair when she’s just narrowly escaped death?), sometimes even interrupted by patches of what really sounds like anachronisms to me. For instance: “Great, Alexia thought, I have gone from soul-sucker to electrical ground. The epithets just get sweeter and sweeter.” She’s been sarcastic before, but not quite like this, and I don’t know that this use of “great” was really in vogue at the time. Sounds a little more like something you’d see in The Dresden Files, actually. Being jerked out of the story by odd things like that was always a disappointment, because I really wanted to like it–I just couldn’t quite get lost in the story, because the writing style wouldn’t let me.
And that’s too bad, because like I said, I love the concept and think Gail Carriger seems like an awesome person. The good thing is, I think these are probably marks of a first novel, because they’re all things that can be improved with a little more security in one’s ability to write well. The characters and story here are quite good, plenty good enough to stand on their own. They just need to be allowed to do so.
(I mean, it’s still better than Twilight, because the female lead isn’t a whiny, self-absorbed brat and the vampires don’t sparkle, but still…)
