This book was first published in 2009 by Dorchester, and now it’s back in a 2-in-1 edition, which includes The Strangely Beautiful Tale of Miss Percy Parker, a 2009 DABWAHA nominee, and the sequel, The Darkly Luminous Fight for Persephone Parker.
If you like steampunk, this is one of the earliest that I can remember in romance, though I’m sure there were others at the time. The author calls it, “Gothic Gaslamp Fantasy Romance,” which I imagine made many of your ears perk up!
To enter, comment below with some of your favorite steampunk stories because we all need more on our TBR piles, right?
Standard disclaimers apply: I’m not being compensated for this giveaway. Void where prohibited. Open to international residents where permitted by applicable law. Must be over 18 and prepared for an adventure. Keep cogs and gears out of reach of small children. Check all top hats for stowaway creatures. Goggles must fit in the overhead compartments and not under the seat in front of you. Comments will close Sunday 1 May at noon, and winners will be announced later that same day.
Good luck, and may the Gothic be with you!
UPDATE!
And our winners are:
1) Tiffany
2) Lynette
3) Liv
4) Alex Thomson
5) Y
6) Nadine
7) Mara
8) Seb
9) Janine
10) AmandaOwl
Winners will be contacted shortly!
I’m coming in pretty late so the steampunk scene, so I only know a couple of authors: Gail Garriger and Kate/Kady Cross. I love both, so I’m definitely going to use this comments section as a TBR pile!
Some Aussie ones you may not have heard of: ‘The Extraordinaires 1: The Extinction Gambit’ & ‘Laws Of Magic 1: Blaze Of Glory’ both by the exceptionally talented Michael Pryor.
Oh cool. I love steampunk, although I haven’t read much lately so I’ll be keeping an eye on this thread for suggestions. As for some of my favorites:
Combustion by Elia Winters is a really good steampunk erotic romance about a woman who builds “felicitation devices” for women and is struggling to get a booth at the worlds fair.
There’s also the Parasol Protectorate series by Gail Carriger which are a lot of fun, and I’m on book two (Changeless) of that. It features a heroine who is into fashion, parasols, solving mysteries, and biting British wit and a very loud and hot tempered Scottish alpha wolf hero.
The first two books of Margaret Foxe’s Elders and Welders series are pretty entertaining. They’re self published though, and lack a bit of polish that a pro-editor would have given them, but are still totally worth picking up.
And my favorite of them all: Boneshaker by Cherie Priest. Not a romance like the others, but a story about a struggling mother and son that includes a reality where the civil war never ended, toxic gas turned everyone in Seattle into zombies, dirigibles and a very interesting and strong female lead.
Anything Gail Gerriger wrote!!!!!!!!!
I keep meaning to read more steampunk, but never quite getting round to it.
I guess my favorite is The Iron Duke.
Ether choronicles
It is not a sub genre I’m very familiar with. I have recently read The Kraken King and, oh, it was fun.
Gail Carriger has been mentioned, so I won’t jump on this bandwagon (And it’s a glorious, glorious bandwagon filled with joy and fun and adventure and hot romance).
I absolutely love the not-exactly-classical steampunk (and not exactly romance, but still SO WORTH A READ), “Diamond Age” by Neal Stephenson. It is SF, and the Victorians are Neo-Victorians, but it has for me all the crucial ingredients of good steampunk: crazy tech, old-fashioned social mores and the trouble that comes from them, Victorians, tensions between the elevated elites and the impoverished common people. Not an easy read – it’s Stephensonian in its length and detail – but a great one, anyway.
I also love the steampunky browser-based text game called Fallen London. It has a London in which the Queen made a deal with a giant magical Bazaar for the life of Prince Consort, and thus London fell into a giant underworld, where you can shake hands with a polite devil, walk into dreams, fall into a trap made by an Pharaoh’s daughter who managed to be still around, construct insane devices, find love and loss – and much more. It may look at a first glance to be an evil free-to-play thing that would love to suck out all of your money, but in fact you don’t need to pay to enjoy it in perfect doses (fifteen minutes in the morning, or during coffee breaks).
And another not-exactly-romance but still plenty romantic – Girl Genius comics by Phil and Kaja Foglio. Steampunk! MAgic! Adventure! Fun! Just go and read it 🙂
Recently finished reading “The Watchmaker from Filligree street” which is not really punk and not romance-only, altough all main characters get their HEAs.
Nevertheless highly recommendable if your catnip list includes: victorian London, Japaneese watchmakers, random gears, women doing science, telegraph and historically accurate descriptions of bomb explosions.
I’ve only started reading Steampunk recently, so I’m looking forward to seeing other people’s suggestions here.
I really enjoyed Meljean Brook’s Iron Seas series. I also loved Karen Memory by Elizabeth Bear, which has a sweet love story in it.
I really enjoyed Meljean Brook and Karen Memory by Elizabeth Bear.
I really liked Clay and Susan Griffith’s Vampire Empire series. It has vampires and romance in a post-apocalyptic steampunk world.
Meljean Brook’s Iron Seas series contains great world-building and is a must for steampunk romance readers—I love them all though some aren’t as fond of The Iron Duke as I am (it’s basically Harlequin Presents in steampunk). You can skip on to Riveted (POC heroine in search of missing sister plus mechanical-bodyparted volcano scientist hero) or The Kraken King (“scribbling spinster” heroine plus POC former-smuggler-and-thief hero) if you want, they happen on different parts of the globe so they stand alone quite well. Or you can dip your toe in with the novella Here There Be Monsters. (For audiobook folks, Faye Adele does a great job with the first part of the series (YMMV) except that she mispronounces “denier” atrociously. It’s money, not denying something!)
Beth Cato’s The Clockwork Dagger is billed as steampunk fantasy rather than steampunk romance, but it has a healer heroine, an airship trip containing spies and assassins, attacks, agendas, action, and a cabin-mate with disturbing secrets. Great world-building. Solid storytelling. It’s wonderful. Imaginative. But it’s a duology, so you need to read The Clockwork Crown for the full story. (No cliffhanger, it’s more that they finish up TCD’s business and then go off to take care of the repercussions/underlying threat…? Sorry I’m so vague, it’s been a while since I read TCD.)
Cindy Spencer Pape’s Gaslight Chronicles are steampunk romances with a touch of magic and paranormal creatures mixed in. (Descendants of the Knights of the Round Table, anyone? Some werewolf aristocracy?) The second story, a novella called Photographs & Phantoms is free at the usual suspects to lure you in. (It caught me but good.) The series is fun and contains satisfying romances and a well-plotted series story arc. (My one peeve is that the backstory for one of the later heroines changes over the course of the series. Oh, well. It’s the parents’ backgrounds and relationship, IIRC. You only notice it if you glom, so it’s not the end of the world.)
Gail Carriger’s Finishing School series is steampunk YA and absolutely delightful in audio. It’s probably also absolutely delightful when read (The Parasol Protectorate is!), but the wonderful narration by Moira Quirk makes it extra delightful. That’s “finishing” as in ending a life. It’s basically a school for proper covert assassins and spies. The heroine is a “covert recruit”—she doesn’t know what she’s in for, and neither do her parents who are happy to send away their problem child to be somebody else’s headache.
Moira Rogers wrote the Bloodhounds series that are steampunk paranormal western adventure romances. Take vampires in the wild west, enhanced warriors to fight said vampires, mad scientists, gadgets, kickass heroines, hot smex, and mix carefully… I need to reread this series, stat!
Adding another card to the Carriger pile. I also like Phillipa Ballentine and Tee Morris’ Ministry of Peculiar Occurrences. Book five, The Ghost Rebellion comes out in June, and my favorite so far is the second, The Janus Affair.
Also, Cindy Spencer Pape’s The Gaslight Chronicles. I haven’t read all of them, but I’ve enjoyed the ones I’ve read. Kilts and Kraken is my favorite of the lot.
Bec McMaster’s London Steampunk series is terrific too.
I love the Meljean Brook Iron Seas series – the e-book shorts fill out some of the gaps (as in “The Blushing Bounder” where we find out how Mina’s constable came to England). And the Zoe Archer stories … which I’m drawing a blank on. And to complete my love, I make jewelry in the steampunk style.
I love the idea of steam punk but haven’t read any that I really adore so look forward to checking out some of these suggestions. I am not into YA or paranormal so I find that cuts out a few in the genre.
A lot of mine have been mentioned so I’ll add a few more that I don’t think have been mentioned.
Zoe Archer’s Blades of the Rose series – some of them are more steampunk-y than others (I think it’s the 3rd book that has an inventor hero). It’s like Victorian Indiana Jones with magic.
E. E Ottoman writes steampunk with a Georgian rather than Victorian feel.
Alexis Hall’s Prosperity series
For romance, definitely Meljean Brooks’s Iron Seas series.
For YA, Gail Carriger’s Finishing School series (I enjoy that one tremendously, even though the Parasol Protectorate series never clicked for me).
For straight steampunk, with very little romance, Cherie Priest’s Clockwork Century series.
I don’t read a lot of steampunk, but I believe Tim Powers’ Anubis Gates is considered a classic in the genre. I also love All Men of Genius by Lev AC Rosen, which is Twelfth Night meets The Importance of Being Earnest with automata and Ada Byron Lovelace. It’s good.
Thanks for the great giveaway!
I am a fan of Moira Rogers Bloodhounds series and Gail Carriger’s Parasol Protectorate series.
The first steampunk romance I read was The Iron Duke by Meljean Brook. That series is amazing.
Lyn Viel of Darkyn fame wrote three steampunk novels that I absolutely love: Her Ladyship’s Curse, His Lordship Possessed, The Clockwork Wolf.
Shanna Swendson is also writing a steampunk series. The first book is out now and is titled The Rebel Mechanics. It’s published as YA but is more NA and appeals to the more mature reader as well. 😉
I love Gail Carriger’s Parasol Protectorate and Bec McMaster’s London Steampunk. Not read many steampunks title, I’m afraid :/.
*jumps on Gail Carriger bandwagon*
I also like the Kady Cross books. Lilith Saintcrow’s Bannon and Clare books are paranormal steampunk. I keep meaning to read more steampunk, but so many of the authors seem to be going with “Victorian but NOT!” and that gets tiresome.
I am writing down every author mentioned and sending lots of samples to my Kindle. 🙂
Kraken King!! by Meljean Brooks
also Lynn Viehl
I don’t read nearly as much steampunk as I should, but I enjoyed The Iron Duke by Meljean Brook (and should really get on reading the rest).
*smacks head* I just realized I spelled Lynn Viehl’s name incorrectly. I should never post before having my morning dose of caffeine
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I didn’t think I’d adding anything new to this list being a big fan of both Iron Seas, especially The Kraken King, and The Parasol Protectorate, but I don’t see some of my other favorites yet,so…
I’ve also enjoyed Devon Monk’s Age of Steam series which takes place in the American West. There’s romance only in the loosest sense of the word. Also Emma Jane Holloway’s The Baskerville Affair series which stars the niece of Sherlock Holmes. Good times.
It’s not a romance per se (though there is a sweet crush) but right now, I’m reading ‘Airborn’ by Kenneth Oppel to my 6th graders and we all LOVE it. Definitely recommend for kids and adult steampunk fans. As for romance, I adore Meljean Brook.
I loved Gail Carringer’s books! Glad to see all the comments. More books to add to my pile!
Gonna ditto everyone’s Gail Garriger recommendation,but also like Bec McMaster.
Hmm. I’m always looking for more amazing steampunk stories! This sounds like it falls right in line! 😀
Some of my favs… Ministry of Peculiar Occurrences by Tee Morris and Pip Ballantine, along with their short story segments.
Badlands (book1) & Clockwork Mafia (book2) by Seleste DeLaney, I’ve enjoyed.
A series that mixes magic and steampunk, Master of Myth by Starla Huchton.
Thank you!
I recently read Nathalie Gray’s ASSASSINS AND INVENTORS, which I really enjoyed; there’s a lot of crazysauce in there, but it was a fun read.
I still haven’t gotten to Clockwork Samurai, the second book, but I loved Jeannie Lin’s Gunpowder Alchemy. Lin has very solid writing and strong characterization, but most of all it’s wonderfully refreshing to see steampunk books that aren’t centered in Europe and actually take on the reality of colonialism.
I’ve read a couple of books from the Gail Carriger series and I’ve read the first book “Kiss of Steel” by Bec McMaster in the London Steampunk series. I think I’ve read a couple of others but those I’ve mentioned are the ones that stand out. I’m always looking for more steampunk to add to my TBR!
I really love Meljean for steam punk. I read the first book of these two and enjoyed it, but never got the second one.
Ok, everyone has mentioned my favorite authors: Brooks,Carringer, McMaster,Saintcrow. Now I’ll have to add Viehl to my TBR pile! Curses I have a towering heap already!
Add my votes for Carriger, Pape, Archer 🙂
I love steampunk! One author that I recommend is Paula Volsky – she was writing steampunk before it was called steampunk. The first one I read of hers was Illusion which is set in an alternate France during the Terror. In recent years, she has publish ed some books as Paula Brandon – I have the first one on my TBR, but haven’t gotten to it yet.
Contemporary steampunk authors I particularly enjoy: Meljean Brook, Kristen Calihan, Bec McMaser, and Emma Jane Holloway. I have not read any Gail Carriger or Delilah S. Dawson as yet.
The Fairypocolypse Series. So good and pseudo-steampunk :DDD