Review: Heartless by Gail Carriger

Heartless
Author: Gail Carriger
Publication: Orbit; Original edition (June 28, 2011)


Description: Lady Alexia Maccon, soulless, is at it again, only this time the trouble is not her fault. When a mad ghost threatens the queen, Alexia is on the case, following a trail that leads her deep into her husband's past. Top that off with a sister who has joined the suffragette movement (shocking!), Madame Lefoux's latest mechanical invention, and a plague of zombie porcupines and Alexia barely has time to remember she happens to be eight months pregnant.

Will Alexia manage to determine who is trying to kill Queen Victoria before it is too late? Is it the vampires again or is there a traitor lurking about in wolf's clothing? And what, exactly, has taken up residence in Lord Akeldama's second best closet?



My Thoughts: This story had all of the comedy of manners/steampunk goodness that we have come to expect from Gail Carriger. Alexia is up to her usual tricks only this time she is also eight months pregnant. She is busy dodging the vampires attacks on her life because of their fear that her infant will be a soul-stealer with the ability to be both human and supernatural. In fact one of the attacks involve killer porcupines. But a solution os found that will satisfy the vampires when Lord and Lady Maccon agree to let their child be adopted by Lord Akeldama. Of course, they intend to move in next door for the sixteen years until the child reaches its majority and, in fact, take up residence in one of Lord Akeldama's closets. Lord Akeldama is his wonderful self - fashion obsessed,  snarky, and always curious.

Having gotten the vampires to stop their constant attempts to kill her, Alexia can focus on other problems. Biffy isn't adjusting well to being a werewolf. Her sister Felicity has taken to wearing dowdy clothing and attending meetings. She has left home and wants to move in with Alexia. Madame Lefoux is troubled, losing weight, and working on some strange device that she won't tell Alexia about. Then, the big problem, a ghost comes to Alexia and says that someone is going to assassinate the Queen.

Alexia immediately gets involved in investigating the last attempt to assassinate Queen Victoria which was made by Lord Maccon's former pack and actually resulted in Conall becoming Lord Maccon. All of the werewolves try to discourage this investigation but Alexia persists. She learns something about her husband's past that she wishes she didn't know.

The story was filled with fashion, wonderfully strange inventions, and interesting characters. The language is wonderful and filled with interesting and amusing turns of phrase. Fans of Alexia will not be disappointed in this story. We will all be eagerly awaiting Timeless in March 2012 to find out what comes next.


Favorite Quote:

Not much of a screamer as a general rule, Alexia's lung capacity was nevertheless sufficient to the task and produced a trumpeting kind of yell. One emitted, however, it did not, as one might expect, bring domestic staff and clavigers running. It had taken only one or two highly embarrassing incidents for the denizens of Woolsey Castle to ignore any and all strange noises produced by Lord and Lady Maccon during their slumbering hours.

Still, one angry husband was sufficient to meet Lady Maccon's needs.

I bought this one at Amazon. You can get it there too.