So it turns out there were two steampunky books about circuses released in 2011, Erin Morgenstern's The Night Circus and this one. They begin similarly, with descriptions of how outsiders first approach the circus, and from there on the comparison is probably inevitable. The world of Mechanique, however, is very different from the lushly-described world of The Night Circus: where The Night Circus is almost overwhelmingly rich, Mechanique seems barren and dry. The story takes place in an unidenti...

I taught a class called Ideas to Outlines, or Outlining for Organics. As part of the process I presented, I tried to cover all the possible starting points for a novel. The hardest for me was a mood story, because I hadn’t actually encountered one with that focus. I’m all about story, and in most modern novels at least, that means plot-focused. Mechanique proved me wrong in the most delightful way. This is not a book for the plot-driven, straight-forward reader, but if you’re willing to lay your...

There were things I liked about this book... and there were things that annoyed me about this book.I felt as if any Readers Advisory Service out there would say? What? You loved China Mieville's 'The Scar?' and you loved Erin Morgenstern's "The Night Circus?" Well then, HAVE I GOT A BOOK FOR YOU! And I have to say... "but...no."This book does indeed have many of the elements that I've loved from both of those books. Grotesquely mechanically enhanced people. A circus with performers who do not di...

There's some lovely writing here, but the story is told in such an episodic fashion - changing narrators, jumping around in time - it makes for a frustrating, rather than fascinating read. The descriptions provided were sparse, making visualization difficult, and the characters do not have distinct personalities. One of them is apparently "a bitch," though this is alluded to, rather than demonstrated. Just because something is made of spare parts, does it have to be soulless? How can someone nam...

Sometimes stories exist that hit all of my buttons at the same time, and Mechanique is one of those rare finds for 2012 that really succeeded in keeping me glued to my ereader. Where do I start? Perhaps with my love for travellers. I watched both seasons of Carnivale a few years ago and that really captured my imagination. The concept of a group of misfits journeying together who somehow succeed in being a family. Then of course, Genevieve Valentine plays with a concept that is near and dear to

Wouldya look at that, I finally finished reading this? I'm not entirely sure why I stopped: it's not a hard read, and the short chapters pull you on through the story pretty well. There's some gorgeous writing, and the whole structure of it -- the mix of POVs, tenses, etc -- makes it pretty absorbing as you try to figure out all the whys and wherefores. Some of the imagery is just... disgusting, visceral, beautiful, all at once.The characters are not exactly likeable, but fascinating: Elena, who...

3.5First and foremost let me say this is a book of characters and ideas. Meaning it's not about the plot, and, as such, the plot that does exist is a bit slow going and mostly serves to further develop the characters.As long as I'm interested in the characters or the ideas, I am totally cool with this. For those who are not, though, this is not the book for you.I also really loved the voice of the story. It's got that whole dreamy quality to it. It's sort of like The Night Circus as written by C...

I didn't leave a review when I read this in 2014. I should have. But I probably couldn't. I still can't. This book was magic. And, at the time, like nothing I'd ever read before. I sniffed at "Steampunk" and as with The Siren and BDSM and Him with M/M, I was put in my place. And now I beat everyone I love over the head with it.READ!(Whack)THIS!(Whack)BOOK!(Whack)DAMMIT!(Whack) (Whack) (Whack)

Though it has steampunk flavoring, Mechanique is a hybrid novel, much like the half-human/half-mechanical characters (creatures?) it describes. It’s a New Weird dark fantasy tale set in a dystopian war-torn landscape. The structure of the story and its narrative cogs are very postmodern. The text vacillates between first person narrative (in the voice of Little George, the Circus gofer) and third person points-of-view that range from brief character sketches to omniscient mis en scenes. The nove...

Beautiful descriptions of horrific things? Mysterious Boss builds her circus - she has rules of just what kind of person she allows to join her travelling troup. I liked the performers and how they deal with the war outside the circus, the war within, each other, and Boss.

Poetic but grim. The Circus Tresaulti travels across a dystopian future. It's performers are lost souls, former soldiers turned aerialists, acrobats and a strong man, each a composite of human, copper and steel. Their relationships are intricate and complicated. Mechanique is about people not punk. Together they form an eclectic family ultimately called to fight for their creator. Highly original, and beautifully written in a unique almost documentary style. Everything that the over-rated Emily

Shortish and weird version: I love this book. If I were a tattoo person (by which I mean a person who gets tattoos, not a literal tattoo person, imprisoned in someone else’s skin), I’d want this book tattooed on my body, but a 3D style tattoo, which would look weird (and would probably look like a growth or a goiter), I know, but I can’t help how I feel!Longer version: This book is another lesson in there being no absolutes in “things I don’t like” statements, at least when it comes to art. A le...

This is written like my dreams.I honestly cannot say whether this novel will resonate for others the way it did for me. The story is exceedingly nonlinear, the narration bounces from first person to second to third close to third omniscent between chapters. There are parts that do not quite make sense on a logical plane when examined closely, mysteries that are never explained or even justified. Many of the characters are not particularly likeable people.But the writing aches. I dream in deeply

Saying too much about the story of this book could spoil it, especially since it's not terribly long. So I'll try not to be too specific, although I'd like to fill up the character limit with all the things I found striking about it.I enjoyed getting to know the characters, and became quite attached to a handful of them. (The character described as "bitch" practically the second she walked onstage ended up being the one I most empathized with.)About two-thirds of the way through, a plot showed u...

Barely more than gibberish. I'm not persuaded it's steampunk, even though it's all about beings with clockwork parts. There's entirely too much rambling about clockwork wings. I'm not persuaded it's a novel. I'm not persuaded it's worth reading at all.We get a lot of novelettes, vignettes on things that seem to have been designed to draw the reader's attention and hold him/her/them a captive audience. One of the parts is about constumes, one about government men and so on... But it doesn't work,...

MECHANIQUE is an enormous book—not in size (for it is rather physically compact) but rather in scope. Valentine has an astonishing talent for suggesting a thousand words of backstory with a dozen or so well-crafted words. And yet, the effect is not at all spare or stripped down; you walk away feeling as though you've just read an epic. All the characters are fascinatingly flawed, full of contradictions. There are no villains in this story; everyone's motivation is understandable and, to varying

I can't write. My artistic gifts are in other areas, and usually I'm okay with that. But every now and again I'll read a book that makes me grind my teeth in frustration -- why oh why oh WHY can't I write like this?! Mechanique: A Tale of the Circus Tresaulti is exactly that kind of book. If I COULD write, I could explain how elegant the writing is, how the author weaves together various stories and viewpoints to gradually build the tale of the Circus Tresaulti, never coming right out and sayin

This is a fucking phenomenal prose poem. I know, it's billed as a novel, but trust me on this: it's a prose poem. The writing is just gorgeous. As soon as I finished, I started all over again, just so I could wallow in the language and recognize the things which resonated on the second reading and hadn't on the first. The last novel that impressed me this much was Nicola Griffith's Slow River, and this is frankly better than Griffth's debut, Ammonite, which is an impressive debut in its own righ...

This book has a plot, it does, it surely does, but the presentation obscures the action almost to the point where it swallows it whole, for the tale is told in first, second and third person and also in the story's present and its past. Confusing? Yes.Absorbing? Yes. Frustrating? Most certainly. Brilliant? Possibly. Flawed? I think so. Whether the flaws outweigh the brilliance is yes to be decided.I bought this book for my Kindle because it's on the Nebula shortlist for best novel and I thought

This book won't be for everyone, and everything I loved - the terse and taut writing style, the ruthless characterisation, the unflinching slow collision of tragedies and unravelling of mysteries - might be something others don't like. True for everything, and I really did love this.It's about belonging and being outside, it's about refuge and sacrifice, it's about wanting and about refusing... it's about loving someone so hard and for so long that you no longer see them, and hating someone so c...