The Inexplicables by Cherie Priest,
Clockwork Century #4
Adventures await Rector ‘Wrek ‘em’
Sherman. About to turn eighteen, he’s facing ejection from the orphanage that
passed for home. He should also choose a trade but work is scarce in
steam-powered Seattle. And Rector has more unconventional plans.
He’s started dealing in sap, a yellow narcotic produced by rebels and outlaws within the city’s toxic walled enclave. What’s worse, he’s been sampling his wares. Other problems include being haunted by an old friend with a grudge. The pressure builds until he sneaks behind the wall himself, seeking both (un)gainful employment and excitement.
As rumoured, he finds a terrifying host
of the hungry undead, and then there’s the monster. Rector’s certain that his
attacker wasn’t human, or undead. But he’s going to need more proof than his
own addled word to expose it. His new mission becomes a compulsion when others
witness the creature’s destructiveness, and give its kinds a name: The
Inexplicables.
The Inexplicables already marks the
fourth book in the UK edition of the Clockwork Century. In my Review Round-Up
of June I nominated, as a first time, the Clockwork Century series as one of my
favourite picks for that month, normally I try to stick with one book but this
series has left quite an impression on me so hence all three so far! The
Clockword Century has shown a lot of diversity a long the way, with a greatly
imaginative, though based on actual historical facts, world and very rich
characters. Each when I started in the next book I was thinking how could this
be connected on the whole? And Cherie Priest manages to surprise me each and
every time, and again so with The Inexplicables. The Clockwork Century is a
series that is impossible to get bored with!
What first falls to notice is that The
Inexplicables is being told from a male perspectives, yes there was Ezekiel in
Boneshaker but it did felt that the emphasis was more on Briar. In the
Inexplicables you follow the adventures of just turned 18-year-old Rector ‘Wrek
‘em’ Sherman. And actually Rector was a character that we met in Boneshaker as
well though briefly. Now it doesn’t matter whether the main protagonist is male
or female, like if have been stressing a lot already, and probably will
continue to do so (since it is really one of her fortes) is that she just knows
how to write up her lead characters. The Rector that we got to learn in
Boneshaker isn’t quite the same as in The Inexplicables. He character has grown
and his own history and mostly his troubles are highlighted much more. Just to
drop right into his character. He has turned sap dealer, some of the readers of
this series know what sap does to a person… And with Rector using some of his
own wears, he is starting to feel the effects… Drastically decreasing his life
expectancy. Wanting to absolve himself from his thoughts of what he has done to
Ezekiel he set off to venture into Seattle. Filled with the rotters. And yes,
The Inexplicables allows us to revisit, in a full length book, the place where
it all started, Seattle.
If you all have read Boneshaker, you know what happened and set this whole series partly into motion. By allowing the story to revisit Seattle again, Cherie Priest has created a great sort of tie-in book, allowing several of the running storylines to neatly collide into each other. There are a lot of recurrent characters that all make a re-entry into The Inexplicables: Ezekiel and Briar Wilkes, Mercy Lynch, Jeremiah Swakhammer and a lot more. With Rector venturing on his own into the walled-in part of Seattle he soon finds out that when you’re on you’re in you will most likely not make it one night. And because there are still occupants in this part of Seattle, Rector owes his life to them. From this point onwards there was a great coming together of several ends of the earlier books. Though you still had the story of Rector himself being told, but within this the story of Rector, Cherie Priest takes the whole story of the Clockwork Century further (I hope your still on track there).
Rector’s storyline focuses on Rector’s
redemption but as you can make up of the recurrent characters he is quite in
for a surprise and this allowed his story to go into another direction, where
the ground of it was laid down a bit earlier. So with re-united friends, Cherie
Priest had a lot of time to introduce two elements. Firstly the Inexplicables
themselves whereby she introduces some terrific folklore into the story, I
don’t know where her imagination might stop… and frankly I hope it doesn’t. And
secondly like I mentioned above the coming together of several ends. I have
said in my other reviews that you felt the world running out of control with rotters
showing up in Louisiana and Virginia, and that I was curious as to how this
would be build up and shown. Now we already got to see some of the plans that
were in store with the sap. Cly had his worries and in The Inexplicables a lot
becomes clear. It’s hard not to mention what is happening in the walled-in part
of Seattle, but its well… This part of the storyline will produce a clear
foundation for the future of the series I think as you now see a lot of things
set into motion.
Another thing that does fall to notice
is that where the second and the third book of the series did focus a part on
the Civil War that is also happening in the series between the Union and the
Confederates, there isn’t a focus of it in The Inexplicables. There is a
mentioning here and there but there are no new steam or diesel powered
warmachines introduced. Taking a break from this side of the story wasn’t a
bother for me as it allowed The Inexplicables to fully focus on the characters
themselves and the storyline so far. And I think this part of the series will
be picked up soon again.
The Inexplicables feels like a summary/intermission
type of book, though only partly. The introduction of Recton to the story and
venturing into the walled-in part of Seattle allowed Cherie Priest to catch up
on some loose ends but also still keeping the new introduction and her lively
imagination run freely. Cherie Priest just excels in her story telling, both in
describing the world and with creating her characters. They are engaging,
compelling and believable. The Clockwork Century books won’t disappoint you,
they will not become boring. The terrible Boneshaker might not have found gold,
but Cherie Priest with her Clockwork Century series certainly has!
Watch out for Fiddlehead due this
November!