Althea Ann's Reviews > The Aeronaut's Windlass

First off, I have to admit that I'm not extremely familiar with Jim Butcher's writing. I know he's wildly popular for his 'paranormal investigation' series, and I've read a few of his short stories in that vein, but fantasy-adventure & steampunk as genres are more up my alley, so I thought that this would be an excellent place to get more familiar with the author.

It wasn't terrible. However, I have to honestly say that it felt dashed-off and not always well-thought-out. The biggest problem might be that we are given a rather cool setting for the book, conceptually - but absolutely ZERO description of the setting is given until more than a third of the way through the book. Until then, we have no concept of where we are, or what the scenario is. Possible spoiler, if you don't want to know until a third of the way through the book: (view spoiler)[We are either on an alien planet or a post-apocalyptic Earth. People live in giant, enclosed cylinders, divided into levels, and most people never see the outside during their lifetime. The surface is inhabited by giant, monstrous animals, and the atmosphere is corrosive. (A bit of an issue there, as the airship crews don't seem to have protective gear keeping them away from the air...) (hide spoiler)].

We've got two female main characters (whom I ended up differentiating by thinking "the big one" and "the small one," which doesn't really say a lot for their depth of character), and male counterparts for them. There's a roguish airship captain. We've also got a couple of eccentric magicians (I mean, "etherealists"), an elderly one and his young apprentice. And a cat. (I was juuust on the line between loving the cat's perspective on things, and thinking it tipped over into too-cutesy-ness.)

Those characters are all of Spire Albion, which is under attack by Spire Aurora. In this book, we do not find out anything substantial about the reasons behind this assault, so do not hold your breath waiting. The Bad Guys are just Bad Guys; the closest we get to their point of view is a glimpse of a few doubts on the part of the minions about the atrocities ordered by the Head Bad Guys. Of course, Albion must mobilize to defend itself.

The society is all vaguely 19th-century-ish, with duels and waistcoats and such. The feel is light-hearted, with plenty of humor, and non-stop action. A great deal of the book is either Hand-to-Hand Combat with Evil Spider-Monsters, or Nautically-Flavoured Airship Battles.

I'm going with three stars, because at no point was the book ever boring or wholly un-enjoyable - but it's not driving me to seek out more of the author's work, either. My main takeaway is that I feel like I wish the author had put more effort and passion into it.

Many thanks to NetGalley and Roc for the opportunity to read. As always, my opinions are solely my own.