Review: Wonderful Steampunk paranormal romance
Rating: 4 out of 5
Date: 04 2, 2014
Quicksilver Soul is the second in The Shadow Guild series and is an amazing addition. I enjoyed the first book but I would have to say that I like this one better; it may be that I am now familiar with the inventive world and intriguing characters that the author has created. This has all the elements that I enjoy in a Steampunk, alternate world, gadgets galore, dangerous villains and of course a romantically involved hero and heroine.Emmet Dennison, the third son of the Duke of Bedford is an Archivist. He went against everything his family could do for him to be part of the Archivist Guild, wanting to carve out a place in the world for himself. Currently he is in charge of government relations trying to mend the Guild’s reputation with New London since the most recent disaster was caused by them. To help rebuild the archives the company brings in Nicola Tesla from Canada, a woman with a brilliant mind and a way with machinery, the only problem is that the Administrators (Archive enforcers) have put Emmet in charge of protecting her and he is not happy.As Nicola works to fix the Archives, she becomes aware of an old enemy in the city but before she can do anything about it, she and Emmet are kidnapped, set to work on a dangerous project with a young boy named Keegan that will put New London in danger.I thoroughly enjoyed this second installment to the series, I like that the alternative world is just different enough that I recognize places yet it is so foreign and there are some interesting characters that are revamped from our historic pasts.Emmet has much to prove to the world, he has ambitions but seems to hesitate moving forward. He has been working for the Guild for many years but seems to find anything else to do but perform his first extraction. He is also hurting from his family’s disinterest and from his best friend desertion years ago leaving him behind at the Guild. Nicola is a kick, she is witty, intelligent and is so interested in her work that she rarely thinks about anything else, let alone a man, but she does find Emmet fascinating and finds herself thinking about him. I like the two together; the banter between them is humorous and definitely adds to the story and they work well together to solve problems. I did think it was strange that when they solved their major problem Emmet kind of closes her off and barely speaks to her, but then in the next minute he was fine and they were finding the closes bed, a promise to her during more stressful times.The progression of the plot works well, starting out a bit slower as Nicola works on the Archives and picking up when they were in danger and then I could not put it down toward the end when the city of New London was in chaos; I had to know what happened. The secondary characters add so much to the story, I liked seeing Piper and Samuel, watching how their relationship has grown and what they are doing (helping Emmet of course) I also enjoyed seeing Jones and hope to read his story someday. I chuckled when I first read who the villain of the story was, Thomas Edison gone mad, what a fun twist on our history. The world of The Shadow Guild is complicated but I believe you could read this book as a standalone, the author explains the mysteries of her world well and introduces you to previous characters seamlessly, however I would recommend the first book because it is an enjoyable story. I highly recommend this book and series and hope there is more to come.Review also posted at Ramblings from a Chaotic MindCopy from publisher for an honest review