Boneshaker - Cherie Priest

Boneshaker by Cherie Priest
My rating: 2 of 5 stars

Boneshaker is very different from other Steampunk books that I've read (and enjoyed). I think it's considered Steampunk because there are airships (not enough, though!) and a few machines that could be considered in the historical Sci Fi realm. Other than that, it does not have any of the characteristics that I look forward to in Steampunk. No adventure. No cool gadgets or scientific experiments (the breathing masks just don't count).

And there's far too much grit and gore. I've never really been interested in zombies. They make a boring enemy, in my mind. This book only confirmed that. Far too much of it is spent running from 'rotters' or shooting them. When I realized it was a zombie book, I knew I was in for a challenge.

This is an apocalyptic dystopia set in the past with some barely recognizable Steampunk elements. It's the bleakest dystopia I've read so far, one where people can't even breathe the air. Most of the time not spent running from rotters is spent trying to breathe through masks that filter out the yellow sludge that turns people into rotters. Let's just say this is not a pleasant place to be. And let's say that unpleasant things happen when people are unable to take their masks off for any reason. Too much time is spent on every little detail of how hard it is to get by there, on details I'd really like to get out of my head somehow.

I could have used more focus on the people and their interactions, because that's when it started to get more interesting (in the last quarter of the book).

I'm actually not sure why I'm giving this a second star. Maybe because I managed to finish it and was actually ok with the ending? Or maybe I liked a couple of the characters (not the main ones), even though I didn't get enough of them. But I really didn't enjoy the experience of reading it much at all and I'm glad it's over.