The Clockwork Century

Stonewall Jackson survived Chancellorsville. England broke the Union’s naval blockade, and formally recognized the Confederate States of America. Atlanta never burned.

It is 1880. The American Civil War has raged for nearly two decades, driving technology in strange and terrible directions. Combat dirigibles skulk across the sky and armored vehicles crawl along the land. Military scientists twist the laws of man and nature, and barter their souls for weapons powered by light, fire, and steam.

But life struggles forward for soldiers and ordinary citizens. The fractured nation is dotted with stricken towns and epic scenes of devastation—some manmade, and some more mysterious. In the western territories cities are swallowed by gas and walled away to rot while the frontiers are strip-mined for resources. On the borders between North and South, spies scour and scheme, and smugglers build economies more stable than their governments.

This is the Clockwork Century. It is dark here, and different.

Cherie Priest has a new website for the world of The Clockwork Century - the setting of her forthcoming novel Boneshaker.

The website is quite gorgeous and gives background on the world (the quoted passage is from the website), the two planned novels, and the two stories. You can read "Tanglefoot" now.

Boneshaker is one of the novels I am most excited to read this year.

So - check out the website, read "Tanglefoot", and then get ready for some Cherie Priest goodness. All four of her full length novels have been outstanding.