A review by snazel
Prudence by Gail Carriger
4.0
Gail Carringer has set herself a hell of challenge, here. She's going to dial up the absurd tone to 11, like a hitch-hiker's-guide-takes-on-paranormal-victorian-england; while using the same world as she's used previously, a generation further, so we have nods to characters and archetypes seen before while reproaching them new; and she's going to take on British colonialism. On the one hand, this is a kind of inevitable choice if she was going to stay in this world, as her characters are involved in Queen Victoria's government, which was fairly global, and on the other hand this is an extremely risky choice as her characters are staunch nationalists/imperialists and her tone is very light and she's dealing with a political system that both had horrific abuses and was intended to be— what we now know was— unjust. Marching in and taking over a country for your own economic benefit is not the side of the angels.
The result is, not bad. It's absurd fun, mostly, and I love all the characters. I am hesitant to say that this is GOOD, because of my idealogical issues with the characters engaging in apologetics for a colonial governments. But after some reflection, I'm entering this as a 4 (would be 3.5) if I could do half stars, for reasons under two headings. a.) It's very clearly the beginning of Pru's literal and idealogical journey. She's quite positive about the empire because she hasn't been faced with anything that would shake that positivity. Characters who have been around longer are more skeptical, b.) this is a fictional world where the empire allows privileges (including bare survival) to supernaturals which aren't afforded elsewhere. Being supernatural, that's a pretty decent reason to support this government's policy, and this is also an alternate history where I can hope the empire unfolded differently.
tldr; lots of fun which made me think seriously about colonialism, which I both respect and resent in a book.
The result is, not bad. It's absurd fun, mostly, and I love all the characters. I am hesitant to say that this is GOOD, because of my idealogical issues with the characters engaging in apologetics for a colonial governments. But after some reflection, I'm entering this as a 4 (would be 3.5) if I could do half stars, for reasons under two headings. a.) It's very clearly the beginning of Pru's literal and idealogical journey. She's quite positive about the empire because she hasn't been faced with anything that would shake that positivity. Characters who have been around longer are more skeptical, b.) this is a fictional world where the empire allows privileges (including bare survival) to supernaturals which aren't afforded elsewhere. Being supernatural, that's a pretty decent reason to support this government's policy, and this is also an alternate history where I can hope the empire unfolded differently.
tldr; lots of fun which made me think seriously about colonialism, which I both respect and resent in a book.