London, 1885. A man in wildly improbable shoes dives from the airship of Queen Margaret the Merciful during a party, lands in an alley in New Old London (distinct, of course, from Old New London), setting in motion a complex conspiracy that reaches from the highest levels of the Queen’s Court to the lowest street urchins in London’s dark corners...and this London, a place of strange contraptions and the unliving creations of unholy alchemy, has plenty of dark corners. Now a city already reeling with refugees from the endless wars between the One True French Catholic Pope and the false and profane Imposter Catholic Pope in Rome faces a whole new challenge, brought about by a petty crook and scalliwag, that grows and grows until it envelops the Bodger Twins, Claire and Donny Bodger, who make great iron weapons of war; the Lady Alys, pledged to marry some duke somewhere to cement a political alliance between England and France; the Cardinal, the scheming, tea-hating representative of the Real and True Pope; and Commander Skarbunket of the London Metropolitan Police, whose keen eye and active intellect help him solve the most complicated of crimes, even if he might sometimes rather wish for a more peaceful existence on a quiet farm raising sheep and fighting off roving bands of Spanish bandits in this wild, humorous adventure that Publishers Weekly calls “A delightful and promising steampunk adventure.” Kirkus Reviews raves, “The enthusiasm is infectious, and readers will quickly find themselves becoming caught up in the characters, the intrigue, and the slightly altered customs of this well-plotted mystery. A satisfying alternate-history work that doesn’t skimp on adventure.”
