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Jay Lake
would like readers to know that, in the event that they can't
discern it from the title, Mainspring is a STEAMPUNK
novel. Yes, capitalized, bolded, underlined, and italicized.
The first page alone has six words or phrases that point readers
in that direction, and one would quickly lose count over the
course of the first chapter. Therein lies one of the chief
troubles with Mainspring: Lake seems to be forcing
his writing into a specific genre, bludgeoning readers over
the head with cliché and predictability, rather than allowing
the story to take shape and finesse the reader into its world.
Sadly, this may be because Lake's writing may lack the ability
to complete this job otherwise.
Mainspring
is the tale of Hethor, a young clockmaker's apprentice (of
course) who is informed, via the archangel Gabriel, that the
world's mainspring is winding down, and Hethor has been charged
with the holy duty of rewinding Earth's driving force on its
brass axis through space. The angel "gleamed…like any brass
automaton" and leaves Hethor one of his silver feathers as
proof of this sacred charge. The journey, of course, entails
trips in "electrick coaches" and a forced pressing into Her
Royal Highnesses Navy. No. Not that Navy. The airship
Navy. But you saw that coming.
Lake
weighs his book down with all of the tropes and trappings
of the steampunk genre, which doesn't leave much room for
his creativity or identity as an author. The narrative is
so forced and hammered into shape that it feels…well…unbelievable.
Surely this seems a foolish slight on a novel about airships
flying to rewind the mechanics of the world on the word of
an angel, but Lake's prose does not allow readers to lose
themselves in it. Authors such as China Miéville and Neal
Stephenson create engrossing worlds for their fictions that
make sense and are rooted in logic. They may be fantastic,
but in the realm of the novel, it is accepted (and acceptable)
as fact. Lake seems so intent on cramming clichéd elements
into his novel that it loses cohesiveness and coherency. The
story jumps from setting to setting so rapidly, opening to
any random page in the first half of this book could result
in a person believing it to be an entirely different narrative.
Only
after the midway point of the book does the story settle down
into a believable tale of adventure and exploration in a strange
world. However, it still falls prey to some cop-out plot elements.
For one, Hethor seems to get out of scrapes when he clearly
doesn't deserve to do so. Apparently, if a person is on a
mission from GOD, He tends not to let a lot of bad things
happen to his emissary. Combine this with the nature of the
novel, and readers are left with a nearly-literal deus
ex machina every fifty pages or so, and that device gets
old quickly.
Overall,
Mainspring feels like the first novel of a promising
young author who is wonderfully creative but overeager and
has yet to find his sense of voice and style. Sure enough,
this is his first novel, but he also has published
more than 100 short stories and has been nominated for the
Hugo Award and the World Fantasy Award—that is unexpected.
Granted, this is Lake's first novel-length fiction, which
definitely accounts for the weakness of narrative, but with
so much writing experience already, this is not a sufficient
get out of jail free card.
Lake
has plenty of creativity, and the novel shows some promise
despite its flaws. While it's certainly not an awful book,
the numerous failings and defects make for a limp read that
never quite hooks readers the way the fantastical realms and
epic quests of sci-fi/fantasy's greats can. Hopefully, in
his next venture, Lake can improve and write something to
fill our collective jonesing for Verne-like, steam-driven
submarines fighting nautical monsters and time-traveling airships
piloted by mad scientists.
(October,
2007)
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