Thursday, December 22, 2011

What Ho, Automaton!, by Chris Dolley


Reggie is an avid fan of detective novels, such as Sherlock Holmes.  When he has the good fortune to cross paths with an automaton named Reeves, he adopts his as a personal assistant of sorts.  First we learn of the pairing's fortuitous meeting, then we learn what happens when Reggie and Reeves team up to investigate the disappearance of several society debutantes.

While I have never read any Wodehouse, I am familiar with the premise of his stories, as well as his iconic characters, so I was able to appreciate the homage that this book was intended to me.  It is a cocktail of Wodehouse and steampunk, with a Sherlock Holmes chaser, and it was intoxicatingly funny.  I found myself snickering and snorting as I read, thinking the entire time "this is pure awesome".

Still a rather new fan to the steampunk genre, I really enjoyed the subtle steampunk aspects to the story.  I particularly loved the Victorian revisionist setting, what with the Queen having mechanical limbs and all.  I found the Reggie and Reeves characters to be well developed, and I loved their interactions.  The first story is the pairing is just a short introduction to them as characters, and an explanation as to how the met.  The real meat and potatoes of the book is the second story, which I found to be hilarious. 

My husband is a big Wodehouse fan, so when I described the book to him, he fell in love with the concept; I think many Wodehouse fans will like the book.  Fans of the steampunk genre will also greatly appreciate, particularly if they have an appreciation for good British humor.  All in all, this book is full of win for me, and I would love to see the author write some follow up stories for Reggie and Reeves.

This book is from my personal library.



If you liked this review, please rate it (and others!) as helpful on my Amazon profile. My Amazon Profile

No comments:

Post a Comment