An outrageous trio of novellas that twist the Victorian era out of shape, by a master of alternate history: โSpooky, haunting, hilariousโ (William Gibson).
Welcome to the world of steampunk, a nineteenth century outrageously reconfigured through weird science. With his magnificent trilogy, acclaimed author Paul Di Filippo demonstrates how this unique subgenre of science fiction is done to perfectionโreinventing a mannered age of corsets and industrial revolution with odd technologies born of a truly twisted imagination.
In โVictoria,โ the inexplicable disappearance of the British monarch-to-be prompts a scientist to place a human-lizard hybrid clone on the throne during the search for the missing royal. But the doppelgรคnger queen comes with a most troubling flaw: an insatiable sexual appetite. The somewhat Lovecraftian โHottentotsโ chronicles the very unusual adventure of Swiss naturalist and confirmed bigot Louis Agassiz as his determined search for a rather grisly fetish plunges him into a world of black magic and monsters. Finally, in โWalt and Emily,โ the hitherto secret and quite steamy love affair between Emily Dickinson and Walt Whitman is revealed in all its sensuous gloryโas are their subsequent interdimensional travels aboard a singular ship that transcends the boundaries of time and reality.
Ingenious, hilarious, ribald, and utterly remarkable, Di Filippoโsย The Steampunk Trilogyย is a one-of-a-kind literary journey to destinations at once strangely familiar and profoundly strange.
Sciencefiction en fantasy