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A review by candacesiegle_greedyreader
Angelmaker by Nick Harkaway
3.0
Nick Harkaway’s new novel is a brew of fantasy, steampunk, adventure, and Dickensian plotting. There’s a good-natured wink to the writing along with the verve of a boy’s-own tale with violence added.
The dilemma is how to explain the plot without giving away any of the fun. Joe Spork is the son of a mobster and the grandson of a clockmaker and master of automata repair. Even though he is always welcome at the Night Market—the mysterious, roving, criminals’ evening out—with great effort he chooses to follow is granddad’s profession. The appearance of a baffling object (charmingly called a hoodad or similar Victorian expression throughout) sets Joe on a wild ride that includes veiled monks, glorious machines, a nonagenarian spy and her gruesome/heroic blind pug, and the deepest loyalties of the Market.
The plot is spirited and fun, and Harkaway loves to write, which he does with enormous dash. He loves the working of machines, which are lovingly explained. But why is this punkish fantasy being marketed as a spy thriller? Readers who pick it up for that reason will thrust it aside with annoyance at its cartoonishness. Those in search of nothing more--or less--than a funk fantasy will have a good time.
The dilemma is how to explain the plot without giving away any of the fun. Joe Spork is the son of a mobster and the grandson of a clockmaker and master of automata repair. Even though he is always welcome at the Night Market—the mysterious, roving, criminals’ evening out—with great effort he chooses to follow is granddad’s profession. The appearance of a baffling object (charmingly called a hoodad or similar Victorian expression throughout) sets Joe on a wild ride that includes veiled monks, glorious machines, a nonagenarian spy and her gruesome/heroic blind pug, and the deepest loyalties of the Market.
The plot is spirited and fun, and Harkaway loves to write, which he does with enormous dash. He loves the working of machines, which are lovingly explained. But why is this punkish fantasy being marketed as a spy thriller? Readers who pick it up for that reason will thrust it aside with annoyance at its cartoonishness. Those in search of nothing more--or less--than a funk fantasy will have a good time.