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A review by sistermagpie
A Study in Silks by Emma Jane Holloway
2.0
I'm not sure how I ultimately felt about this book. There were scenes that drew me in, but overall when the book ended I felt like I'd missed something. There's a fairly complicated mystery plot which might or might not be solved by Sherlock Holmes' niece. I didn't really like dragging SH into the story to give her an important connection. Especially since she's also got to be given the rather cliche "caught between two worlds" backstory. Apparently SH's sister ran away with a sea captain who also grew up in the circus so Evelina can have two hot love interests who are both inadequate in the end.
The story takes place in a steampunk version of London with the city divided up between different steam barons who fight over territory and keep anyone else from freely inventing things.
There's also magic, which was a bit much for me. The central drive of the villain seems to be to mix technology and magic by way of spirits that can animate robots. The heroine can already to this with little sprites called devas. They didn't mesh well with the plot for me and sometimes felt like they were trying to hard to be sort of sophisticated Disney Sidekicks.
The story takes place in a steampunk version of London with the city divided up between different steam barons who fight over territory and keep anyone else from freely inventing things.
There's also magic, which was a bit much for me. The central drive of the villain seems to be to mix technology and magic by way of spirits that can animate robots. The heroine can already to this with little sprites called devas. They didn't mesh well with the plot for me and sometimes felt like they were trying to hard to be sort of sophisticated Disney Sidekicks.