Tee Morris

Pip Ballantine

Exiled to America, Braun and Brooks follow a series of nautical and aerial disasters to a new threat, known only as the Maestro. Original. 20,000 first printing.

Dawn's Early Light

Sarah Escorsa

Actual rating: 3.5 stars

Oh, look! Yet another scintillating review that begins with two totally useless paragraphs! Go me and stuff!

There’s something to be said about the healing properties of good old steampunk, methinks. Especially when said steampunk doesn’t take its little self seriously at all. It’s actually been proven scientifically. Indeed it has. Numerous times. By Dr Prawn Himself (he is my family physician of many years, in case you didn’t know) and his shrimpy research team (view spoiler)[
  What? You’ve never heard of them? Where have you been living these last two centuries? Under a barnacle-encrusted rock or something?
 (hide spoiler)]. The world-renowned scientist and his pincer-clad flunkies have demonstrated time and time again that steampunk significantly reduces Post-Traumatic Crappy Book Disorder (PTCBD™) symptoms and cures (yes, cures!) even the most desperate cases of Severe Fantasy Rip-Offitis (SFRO™). 

Now, I obviously have a lot of respect for Dr Prawn, but I have to admit I had my doubts about the supposed therapeutic effects of steampunk. Still, being a nefarious tyrant doesn’t mean one isn’t Super Extra Open Minded (SEOM™), so when the Shrimpy Doc prescribed reading 265 pages of Dawn’s Early Light ten times a day (view spoiler)[
  this is where you’re supposed to check how many pages this book actually has and then do the very logical math and stuff
 (hide spoiler)] as an effort to replenish, rejuvenate and generally reinvigorate my mental bookish health, I promptly said “why the fish not?!” And here we are. 



Hey now, it’s not like I didn’t warn you first two paragraphs were completely pointless so go be grumpy in someone else’s review, will you?

Okay, so this series recounts the rollicking adventures of one Eliza Braun (hereby known as the Colonial Pepperpot), New Zealand native and trigger-happy agent of Her Majesty’s Ministry of Peculiar Occurrences and her 
  slightly uptight
 colleague Mr Wellington Books (hereby known as the Dashing Archivist), archivist (view spoiler)[
  as you might have guessed because you’re super bright and stuff
 (hide spoiler)] turned field agent of Her Majesty’s Ministry of Peculiar Occurrences. Granted, this series probably won’t win the Nobel Prize of Literature (then again, who knows?) and it is revoltingly light, but it also happens to be bloody fishing entertaining and funny as shrimp. So there. Besides, one cannot spend one’s time reading philosophy, right? Right. So glad we agree.

In this particular instalment our Colonial Pepperpot and Dashing Archivist are urgently dispatched to the Americas for reasons unknown. Initially. Then they become known but it would be spoiler spoiler spoiler to reveal what said reasons are (also, I feel as apathetic as an anemic barnacle today) so spoiler spoiler spoiler I won’t. You are quite welcome. I will, however, endeavor to disclose some Delightfully Delightful Miscellaneous Early Light Facts (DDMELF™) for what I assume will undoubtedly be your utter pleasure:

✔ Aging Queen Victoria’s apartments look like a Marseille bordello. (And that’s a fact.)
✔ Some voices are so bloody sexey they can keep teakettles piping hot. (True story.)
✔ The Colonial Pepperpot arches her eyebrows at you? Be terrified. Be very terrified. (Just ask the Dashing Archivist.)
✔ Loosening one’s corset reinvigorates blood flow to the brain. (I kid you not.)
✔ Nikola Tesla was a paranoid, reckless crackpot with an odd thing for pigeons. (Why didn’t he have an odd thing for shrimps, I wonder?)
✔ Little strumpets play Dashing Archivist like Stradivarii. (Which is quite outrageous, if you ask me.) 
✔ The hardest, meanest bitch always wins. (Can’t disagree with that.)
✔ Abandoned 
  technological triumphs of terror
 are very fishy indeed. (Trust me on that one. I know a lot about terror. And about fish, too. Especially fishy ones.)
✔ Henry Ford says hi. (He’s friendly like that.)



Don’t’ ask.

✔ There are some wonderfully exotic tribes in Baltimore, Maryland. (Well that’s what the Prince of Wales thinks, anyway.) 
✔ Interrupting an investigation with fisticuffs is not a good idea, according to some. (I beg to differ and stuff.)
✔ Thomas Edison is a bloody @$%!!!&*@ ← censored. (You got that right.)
✔ All Hail the Most Glorious Scientific Smackdown of the 19th Century. (You won’t read about this on Wikipedia, I’m afraid.)
✔ Glasgow kisses are underrated. (And how.)
✔ Scottish mad scientists always have wild, receding red hair. And wear kilts. (Because duh.)
✔ The Ministry of Peculiar Occurrences has the best weapons ever. (A Brouhaha set on “Pub Crawl”—or even better, on “Typhoon”—and a Jack Frost set on “Polish Winter?” Do want.) 
✔ Megalomaniacs showdowns for the win! (I should know.)
✔ The whisky didn’t make this review any better so I better vaporize on impact, like some friendly foes in this story.

➽ Nefarious Last Words (NLW™): Just read this series already and let me go to bed, okay? Thank thee most kindly and stuff. 



· Book 1: Phoenix Rising ★★★★
· Book 2: The Janus Affair ★★★★
· Book 4: The Diamond Conspiracy ★★★
· Book 5: The Ghost Rebellion ★★★★
· Book 6: Operation: Endgame ★★★★

Dawn's Early Light

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