Usually I love her stuff, but this one was a resounding eh. ( )

I'm a SF fantasy reader who's read a little steampunk starting with Michael Moorcock's Warlord of the Air (1971)trilogy. I almost didn't read this book because of the slightly negative reviews on Amazon, but I happy to say I gave it a try and very much enjoyed it. I'd recommend putting on Abney Park CD and settling in for a lighthearted air ship fun. If the sex and romance are too much for you, non romance reader like myself a few pages skimmed will land you back into the adventure. ( )

This is absolutely the best alternate universe / steampunk / romance / pirate adventure I've ever read. It's also the ONLY alternate universe / steampunk / romance / pirate adventure I've ever read and, with any luck, will the the last.

It's all terribly silly, with great chunks of action off-page and summed up in a sentence. One chapter ends with our protagonists locked up and facing certain execution, and the next begins with them running down an alley and telling each other how lucky it was that XXX happened so that they could escape. They also have a tendency to leap upon each other's bones any time they have five minutes to spare, despite the press of events (like needing to escape from the bad guys or rescue someone).

The only saving grace of this book is that it doesn't take itself at all seriously. The sex scenes are uniformly PG-rated, the steampunk technology is kept firmly in the background, and the characters -- if highly unbelievable -- are at least amusing. ( )

This is another one of MacAlister's "it is but it isn't" books. Meaning it's steampunk, but it's only steampunk because the modern man gets tossed into the world of his favorite book and meets an intriguing airship captain.

You either like Katie MacAlister's books or you don't. I do. I like her humor, her heroines, and the incredible supporting characters she comes up with. Her books are fun, light reads. ( )

The heroine, a new captain and her first voyage of an old ship needs to keep her head in order to prove herself to her crew. What she doesn't need is finding two stowaways onboard. A man and his sister, who have a strange way of speaking and talk gibberish. The hero remembered experimenting in his lab than a big explosion. then nothing until he wakes up in what he thinks is a steampunk convention. The sexy captain instantly catches his eye, corset and all and he makes no qualms about hiding his attraction. In fact, he's charmingly honest about almost everything. He's got an innocent way about him that is refreshing. The heroine finds him exceedingly attractive with his different colored eyes and lean body. Though she fights it for a moment, she eventually gives into her desire and the two quickly become loves. The romance and sexual development between the hero and heroine was very quick but honest. The heroine is forthright with the amount of overs she's had, turns out that every one of them is a key part of the story which I found comical. The one think that put me off was the authors having the hero frequently comment on the heroine's 'boobs'. Firstly, she is a proper lady, despite her amount of lovers and she's a very capable captain of a steamship in the middle of a war. Also, 'boobs' just made him sound more immature than he already acted. I did absolutely LOVE the setting of this book and the world they live in. Every major culture is alive and thriving from Roman's to Moghuls, to Prussia to America. I found it so creative and adored reading about how these empires coincided with one another. Funny enough and I suppose true to form, they are all constantly at war with each other. Other then the setting, I didn't much love the characters and they were very light and fluffy. It was an ok read at best but not anything to die over. ( )