The Affinity Bridge
A Newbury & Hobbes Investigation
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3.9 • 127 Ratings
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- $11.99
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- $11.99
Publisher Description
Get ready to follow dazzling young writer George Mann to a London unlike any you've ever seen and into an adventure you will never forget, in The Affinity Bridge.
Welcome to the bizarre and dangerous world of Victorian London, a city teetering on the edge of revolution. Its people are ushering in a new era of technology, dazzled each day by unfamiliar inventions. Airships soar in the skies over the city, while ground trains rumble through the streets and clockwork automatons are programmed to carry out menial tasks in the offices of lawyers, policemen, and journalists.
But beneath this shiny veneer of progress lurks a sinister side.
Queen Victoria is kept alive by a primitive life-support system, while her agents, Sir Maurice Newbury and his delectable assistant Miss Veronica Hobbes, do battle with enemies of the crown, physical and supernatural. This time Newbury and Hobbes are called to investigate the wreckage of a crashed airship and its missing automaton pilot, while attempting to solve a string of strangulations attributed to a mysterious glowing policeman, and dealing with a zombie plague that is ravaging the slums of the capital.
At the Publisher's request, this title is being sold without Digital Rights Management Software (DRM) applied.
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
SF editor Mann (The Solaris Book of New Science Fiction) sets this leisurely mystery, published in the U.K. by Snowbooks in 2008, in an alternate 1901 London where steam-powered taxicabs fill the streets and brass automatons have begun to replace human labor. Sir Maurice Newbury, British Museum anthropologist and occult connoisseur, and his Watsonesque assistant, Miss Veronica Hobbes, are summoned to investigate the crash of a cyborg-piloted helium zeppelin. Meanwhile, a plague is spreading through London's poorer quarters, turning everyday citizens into bloodthirsty, zombielike "revenants" and threatening the stability of the Empire. Mann's stiff-upper-lipped Victorians chat at great length over cups of Earl Grey and occasionally whack zombies and robots in arduous action passages, and the unnecessary details and painfully stilted dialogue bring nothing fresh to the steampunk subgenre.
Customer Reviews
Enjoyable, if a bit derivative
I found Mr. Mann's story to be an enjoyable and generally absorbing read. Elements of a classic zombie tale, a bit of Holmesian sleuthing, hints of a potential romance, a dash of the arcane, and a "Girl Friday" with way more up her corset than the hero suspects all combine easily to form a story worthy of a sequel. I look forward to trying further volume.
Amazing romp!
If you like your mysteries steam-powered, this is a book for you! Affinity Bridge is a Holmesian mystery wrapped in a steamy world with a female Watson that has more than a little Archie Goodwin in her. It's witty, action-packed and so creative that you'll keep reading even if you solve the mysteries before the Newbury, Bainbridge and Hobbes do! A delightful romp and an excellent read!