So I continue with the “The Adventures of Baron von Monocle” young-adult (YA) series by Jon Del Arroz. This time I cover the fourth and fifth novels in the series, which are volumes 4 and 6 of the series. (Vol. 5 is a short story collection I covered in the prior post.)
As noted, this is a popular YA/steampunk series. It is set on an alternate world whose highest tech (so far) is steam. This means they have steam-powered “horseless carriages” and steam-powered airships, these being heavier-than-air vehicles with large rotating turbines that somehow are able to fly. Weapons are mainly swords, guns (I think at best semi-automatics), and cannons.
The action has been mainly focused on people on the Rislandian peninsula of the Areth continent. While there is no map in these volumes, there are a couple on the website the author set up on Rislandia. This peninsula is divided between the “good guy” nation of the Rislandian Kingdom, under the fair rule of King Malaky XVI, and the expansionist “bad guys” Wyranth Empire, under the rule of the mysterious Iron Emperor who is named Ivan.
When we last left things, the invasion of Rislandia by Wyranth was halted, but Rislandia’s last airship crashed in the process. Can they rebuild it and their nation, pushing out the Wyranth? Add to that, Ivan, the Iron Emperor, has been asking Zaira von Monocle, the owner of that last airship, the Liliana, for her hand in marriage. She is reluctant for many reasons, not the least of which is her budding romance with Ethan von Lantern, one of Rislandia’s Knights of the Crystal Spire. We actually met Ivan earlier in the series, and he is about the same age as Zaira.
This then is the central theme of the fourth volume: Iron Wedding. Can Rislandia get the Wyranths to return to their lands? They need their airship to help do this, but for some reason can’t get it to fly again. The man who invented it is dead and with it the secret of how it flew. Strangely, something is needed more than just the rotors to bring it aloft. And not only that, but it seems the Wyranth have been building other technologies the Rislandians don’t have, such as automatons, which they use as soldiers.
While her friend James and Ethan are off on a mysterious mission (apparently covered in a short story), Zaira sees no other option for her people but to accept Ivan’s offer. Things move forward with the wedding, despite the death of an important secondary character in the series. Zaira (and the reader) learns more about some of the mysteries of this world, why Ivan is so keen on marrying her, and the secrets that allow both the airship to work as well as the automatons. And when it seems that the two are about to be wed, but a new danger emerges: an invasion by the Nightmen who quickly overwhelm the combined Rislandian and Wynanth forces until James and Ethan show up in steam-powered mecha armor. And then Zaira is able to use a crystal to help stop the Nightmen — at least temporarily.
With Rislandia and Wyranth now forced to work together against the new threat of the Nightmen, in the fifth novel, The Crystal Conspiracy, Ivan reveals the new Wyranth airship, bigger and more powerful than the prior one. Zaira will captain it, with a combined crew including new small flying machines and the new mecha. This will be important, as on a trial run they encounter a Nightman who seems to be using a crystal to devastating use. But instead of using this new and powerful airship in the war against the Nightmen, instead, the proposal is to go on an expedition to a far north island chain, the Dragonmist Isles, in search of a powerful “ultracrystal” that could turn the tide.
Along the way, they find the ruins of a lost civilization, run into giant lizards, and worse, dragons and Nightmen, including one who is a shaman with his own power crystal.
Will they succeed? And will they be able to push the Nightmen out of Rislandia and Wyranth?
While this novel concludes well, the overall war against the Nightmen is not finished. Sadly, it’s unclear how many more novels in this subplot will be written. There may be a couple of more. And how will the relationship between Zaira and Ivan continue? Especially in light of what happened in the previous novel.
I do look forward to what will come next.
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