The Iron Wyrm Affair

Today’s post is on “The Iron Wyrm Affair” by Lilith Saintcrow. It is 323 pages long including an author interview and a sample of the next book ‘The Red Plague Affair’. It is published by Orbit books. The cover has the two main characters on it both of them looking at the reader. Bannon is casting a spell with her left shoulder touching Clare who is looking intelligent. The intended reader is a Steampunk fan but Saintcrow is a wonderful writer so anyone who likes well written stories with interesting characters, and a heart pounding mystery then this is for you. There is some language and hinting at sexuality but nothing on page so anyone over the age of 14 should be just fine. The story is told in third person close mainly from Bannon or Clare’s perspective. There Be Spoilers Ahead.

From the back of the book- Emma Bannon, forensic sorceress in the service of the Empire, has a mission: to protect Archibald Clare, a failed, unregistered mentath. His skills of deduction are legendary, and her own sorcery is not inconsiderable. Unfortunately they can barely tolerate each other…

Review- To start with the blurb is wrong. Bannon and Clare do not dislike each other, they just are very different people. Mentath’s are people who are totally logical, always, and sorcery is not logical. That is the main point of disagreement, Bannon is a Prime Sorceress and Clare is a high level Mentath. The world that Saintcrow has created is very close to our own, if you have a passing familiarity with England then you will see what she has changed. For example England is not England but Britannia and Britannia has its own intelligence, it is more than just an ideal but a real being of ancient wisdom. The queen is Victrix not Victoria. I enjoyed identifying all the differences from our world to the fictional one. The magic/logic in this world is fun. Most of the time when magic is in a story there is no talk about things being illogical but not in this one. That is a major point because magic is illogical and that is difficult for Clare to deal with as a Mentath. How Clare deals with it is that he thinks that it is just a logic that he cannot understand at this time. That thought pattern saves him from the madhouse over the course of this book. The magic is slowly revealed over the course of the book like Clare’s thinking. Bannon is a very powerful sorceress who is not afraid of her power but she is smart with it. Something that I have thought of but Saintcrow directly talks about is when sorcerers are having a duel the easiest thing would be to have someone else just come up and stab them in the back. She deal with this by having Shields. Shields are people who protect sorcerers from physical attacks when they are magical dueling. There are so many layers to this book that I could just go on and on. But read it yourself, it is worth your time.

I give Five out Five stars. I get nothing for my review and I borrowed this book from my local library but I am going to be buying it.