Skip to main content

Makin' My Ventriculator Pound


Ticker by Lisa Mantchev is a delightful steampunk novel. I've really haven't read much in the steampunk genre (Leviathan by Scott Westerfeld, and the first book of the Parasol Protectorate by Gail Carriger, although I'm sure die hard steampunk fans might have issues with both of those). But I loved the cover of this one (I know! But I can't lie, as I get older, I judge covers even harder). I requested it from Netgalley and received my first egalley for review! This was also the first whole book I read on my kindle (fun fact.).

Ticker is about young Penny Farthing. The women in her family inherit a mysterious heart ailment. Both of her sisters have died from it. She is saved from dying by an augmentation: a replacement, clockwork heart. However, the person who replaced it for her has been accused of several heinous murders, and is currently on trial. Then Penny's parents are kidnapped.

Ticker is an adventure of a novel. There are very few slow points, and even the ones without racing adventure are filled with bits of character development. I loved Mantchev's steampunk world. She did a great job of making me believe in it without stopping to explain things constantly. She writes like the world exists which makes it so much easier to step in to it and believe. 

My favorite part of Mantchev's writing was the way Penny talks about her heart or Ticker. It works so well in regards to having a clockwork heart, but it also mimics the way real hearts work. I loved it.
.
I would recommend this book to any fantasy lover willing to try the steampunk genre, or anyone who loves steampunk in general. Although it didn't hit a new favorite for me, I really enjoyed it. Mantchev's interpretation of steampunk is clever and exciting. 

~~~ I recieved a free egalley of this book in return for an honest review. ~~~

Favorite Quotes (taken from egalley and subject to change in final version):
I am more than a pretty little windup doll.

We've all had terrible things happen to us [...] Only the weak use it as an excuse to prey upon others.

There are no heroes in a situation like this [...] There are only the dead and the survivors. 



Comments

  1. I haven't heard of this one before but it sounds interesting, steampunk can be pretty hit or miss in my experience (like everything I guess), so I'm glad to hear you enjoyed it!

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. I definitely agree! But this one was a good read. It's pretty short too, although I read it on my Kindle, I think it's like 324 in print?

      Delete

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Blarghhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh. Hello lovelies. I'm feeling super overwhelmed by life since I'm doing Camp Nanowrimo and trying to move and find a place to live 2600 miles away. So that's my excuse for missing last week. But now you get two weeks in a row. So this week's theme (hosted as always by The Broke and the Bookish ) is... Top Ten Favorite Movies   (And I picked Scary Movies) I have a secret. Or I guess I had a secret. And that secret is that I love  scary movies. Like anything that plays on gross special effects or melting walls or sudden appearances--I'm totally down for it. (This has only back fired on me once--when I had a panic attack watching Saw 2--I don't wanna talk about it...) So in no particular order, movies that really impressed me with their scare factors: 1. Thir13een Ghosts -- there's this scene with a glass door that is ingrained in my brain.  2. Haunting in Conneticut -- aw man, this movie is sooo good. I actu

Why Should I Trust You?

Hello Lovelies!! It's my finals week, so I'm going to make this one quick.  This week's Top Ten Tuesday (by the Broke and the Bookish ) allows us to fill in the blank! So I will be bringing you... The Top Ten Books with Characters Who are Unreliable Narrators (AKA BIG OL' LIARS). I love unreliable narrators because you never know if they're actually being unreliable or not. Occasionally they tell the truth, but occasionally they lie. So here we go... 1. Nothing by Janne Teller 2. Liar by Justine Larbalestier 3. Fortunately, the Milk by Neil Gaiman 4. Finnikin of the Rock by Melina Marchetta 5. Don't Look Back by Jennifer L. Armentrout 6. Code Name Verity by Elizabeth Wein 7. Jane Eyre by Charlotte Bronte 8. The Princess Bride by William Goldman 9. Throne of Glass by Sarah J. Maas 10. I'll Give You the Sun by Jandy Nelson Many of these books feature the unreliable characters as side characters and not main charac

More Diversity in Your Book Diet

Hello Lovelies! As usual Top Ten Tuesday is brought to you by the lovely people over at The Broke and the Bookish . Today's topic is Top Ten Books for People Who Like X, and I'm going to go with... Top Ten Books for People Who Like Diversity Thanks to the efforts of groups like We Need Diverse Books, diversity is having a resurgence in young adult and children's books. For the last couple years, I have been trying to read more books with diverse characters or by diverse authors. (Diverse in this respect includes race, sexuality, gender, and disability). I haven't endeavored to challenge myself to only read a certain type of book i.e. only those by women of color or anything that isn't by a white heterosexual male, but I try to be extra aware of the characters and ask myself if they actually are white (sometimes the text doesn't say it, sometimes people just assume it!) and if being white is necessary for the character or not.  But here are my top t