palmedfire

Well, I'm not reading as fast as some of the other people on my flist who are doing this, but I'm trying not to worry about that. Just going to keep plugging away at this.

I picked up Soulless right before Christmas, on recommendation from zehavit_lamasu and to bump my Amazon order up enough for free shipping. Only just got around to reading it, but that sort of thing happens a lot in my house. Too many books, such a trial ;)

So, about the book: Soulless is a roughly Victorian-era, steampunk AU sort of book, set in a London where vampires and werewolves not only do exist, but are part and parcel of society. There's some very interesting things set up about the supernatural society - the idea that one needs an excess of soul to be turned into either vampire or werewolf (if you don't have sufficient soul, the change kills you), and the idea that while werewolves have packs, vampires have hives, which isn't something I've seen before. Then again, I'll admit to not having read a ton of vampire lit.

Anyway, our main character is a wonderfully strong-willed woman named Alexia Tarabotti. Alexia is far too bright and blunt for her social status and time period, and also has no soul. This gives her the ability to neutralize supernatural powers, which is either incredibly handy, or rather inconvenient depending. Often both at once.

I truly loved this book, Gail Carriger manages to be incredibly witty and amusing all through the story, even when the situation is getting bad. Alexia is a compelling character, so perfectly in-voice for the time period, but yet so a women who would have done much better born later in history.

I am looking forward to picking up the rest of the series (Changeless, Blameless and Heartless) at some point.