Steampunk and magic on the raw, dusty frontier provide the backdrop for Megan E. O’Keefe’s debut novel, Steal the Sky. Our protagonist, Detan Honding, is stuck in a backwater mining town with his sidekick Tibs. Their airship is in a state of disrepair, but he’s given an opportunity to steal a ship from a ruthless figure in the community. Because the job, of course, doesn’t go smoothly, Detan soon finds himself under the scrutiny of the woman who employed him – Watch Captain Ripka, a local gang boss – Commodore Thratia Ganal (with the endearing nickname of Throatslitter), and a doppel. What’s a doppel you ask? A doppel is an illusionist/shape-changer who can assume the visage of anybody, which makes it difficult for Detan to always know with whom he’s speaking. But our roguish hero didn’t get far in life by being slow-witted.
Those mines aren’t just regular mines for coal, ore, or metals. No, the people here mine selium, a substance both magical and essential. Its purposes are many (magic, keeping airships afloat, reshaping one’s appearance, mending to broken bones) and dangers are equal as the substance can be flammable, but its value is only eclipsed by the people forced into labor for mining it. In short, the material can do many things.
What we have with Steal the Sky, essentially, is a heist story. O’Keefe tells a ripping story in that framework with some fun characters and a nice touch of world-building. In a novel where a strong element is deception through a character who can change their appearance, O’Keefe managed to keep several plot points under wraps throughout the story. She revealed those points at what felt to be appropriate points in the narrative allowing for the full weight to be appreciated.
Of course the natural comparison for Detan is Malcom Reynolds, he of Serenity/Firefly. O’Keefe evokes a similar feel of the raw frontier as did Whedon’s space-western. Where O’Keefe raises the stakes is the judicious inclusion of magic and enhancing the western setting with steampunk elements.
Steal the Sky is a fun romp that shows a lot of promise for O’Keefe in her debut novel. With the quality of the storytelling as a whole, I shouldn’t be surprised O’Keefe was a first place winner in the Writers of the Future. Not only is Steal the Sky O’Keefe’s debut, it launches the Scorched Continent series and does a fine job of laying out a foundation for future stories.
I thought the cover did a great job of evoking the story and representing the fun feel within its pages. From the characters at the bottom of the cover, it goes from a western to steampunk with the airship/zeppelin floating in the sky. When Steampunk includes a thick helping of magic, I find myself more drawn to such stories. Readers who enjoyed Beth Cato’s Clockwork Dagger and Jim Butcher’s The Aeronaut’s Windlass will likely find themselves drawn into Megan E. O’Keefe’s adventurous Steal the Sky.
Recommended
© 2016 Rob H. Bedford
Mass Market Paperback | 978-0-85766-490-7
Published by Angry Robot Books | January 2016
http://meganokeefe.com/ | http://meganokeefe.com/steal-the-sky/
