A review by mlklein1
The Affinity Bridge by George Mann
2.0
I had some difficulty with this novel - though it should of course be noted that I finished it. I also should say up front that I was so blown away by the very end of the book that it is seriously making me consider reading the next Newbury & Hobbes investigation. Excellent cliff hanger, Mr. Mann!
I don't have enough experience (any) with the steampunk genre to know whether the problems I had were with this book specifically, or the genre as a whole, so I'll be brief.
I felt Mr. Mann had planned a wild ride for us, but then it feels as if it was edited down to the key elements. There are no red herrings, which we come to expect in a mystery, don't we? Everything every character says or encounters has a bearing on the case. Yet at the same time, sometimes Mann goes into drudging detail about tiny day to day things the characters, particularly Newbury, does.
Additionally, I found Newbury to be a bit of a Hollywood cartoon hero. He is set upon relentlessly by our villains, and despite the fact that he frequently is about to succumb to his wounds and the blackness around him, he always manages to muster a little more energy to win the fight or escape. And this is in stark contrast to the tone of the rest of the novel that could easily have been written in the 1800s, save for the new technology peppered throughout.
Perhaps it's a credit to Mr. Mann that he very effectively has written a novel that appears true to the period. Then he adds the steampunk tech, and that’s fine, but then he adds Newbury, right out of a 1980s Hollywood buddy cop film. And the weight of those three elements together was just about too much for me.
I don't have enough experience (any) with the steampunk genre to know whether the problems I had were with this book specifically, or the genre as a whole, so I'll be brief.
I felt Mr. Mann had planned a wild ride for us, but then it feels as if it was edited down to the key elements. There are no red herrings, which we come to expect in a mystery, don't we? Everything every character says or encounters has a bearing on the case. Yet at the same time, sometimes Mann goes into drudging detail about tiny day to day things the characters, particularly Newbury, does.
Additionally, I found Newbury to be a bit of a Hollywood cartoon hero. He is set upon relentlessly by our villains, and despite the fact that he frequently is about to succumb to his wounds and the blackness around him, he always manages to muster a little more energy to win the fight or escape. And this is in stark contrast to the tone of the rest of the novel that could easily have been written in the 1800s, save for the new technology peppered throughout.
Perhaps it's a credit to Mr. Mann that he very effectively has written a novel that appears true to the period. Then he adds the steampunk tech, and that’s fine, but then he adds Newbury, right out of a 1980s Hollywood buddy cop film. And the weight of those three elements together was just about too much for me.