Whitechapel Gods [Mass Market Paperback]

I finished reading Whitechapel Gods over the weekend and was generally satisfied, but ultimately underwhelmed.

Taking place in Victorian England, and borrowing *heavily* from the plot of The Matrix, Whitechapel Gods depicts an England that is threatened from within by two modern age deities, Mama Engine and Grandfather Clock, who have taken up residence in Jack the Ripper's hunting grounds and rule over their kingdom with fear, paranoia, and brute force....employing steampunk cyborg turncoats known as black and gold cloaks to police the streets, and the fearsome robotic Boiler Men as their stormtroopers. The residents of Whitechapel, after staging an unsuccessful rebellion against their oppressors, now live quiet lives of desperation, and are either controlled in mind by the hypnotic machinations of Grandfather Clock, or in body by fueling the furnaces of Mama Engine's Stack.

We come into this world through Oliver and his small band of insurgents, including Missy, the prostitute with a dark secret, and Tommy, the gentle giant who's been infected with a technovirus that converts the human body into mechanical parts. His is one in a number of terrorist cells in Whitechapel that are all fighting this industrial regime from the shadows as they develop a secret weapon capable of destroying these dark gods.

First time author S.M. Peters is clearly trying to channel the Weirdness of authors like China Mieville and Grant Morrison, and succeeds in the small details, such as his descriptions of Tommy's technovirus, or the grimy, soot-choked, steel prison that Whitechapel has become. However, I feel that he struggled in tying the little ideas into the Big Picture. Things like how Mama Engine and Grandfather Clock came into existence (I *think* they're ideological expressions of the 20th Century more than actual, physical entities...?) what the purpose of the third god is, and what Oliver's Macguffin weapon do are either never fully explained or abandoned all together. This is the kind of story that I think would have had much more success as a comic book, where a visual sense of the narrative would have been a huge help in telling the story and keeping the plot moving. Additionally, the Uprising seemed very unimpressive....maybe because by the time Peters finally moved all the characters into place and was ready for the final act to begin, I was ready for the book to end. Two-thirds of the book was spent in anticipation of this battle, and yet it all kind of came and went without much fanfare.

Ultimately, I would rather read an ambitious book that doesn't quite succeed than one that doesn't even attempt to try. Whitechapel Gods imagines The Matrix in Victorian England and almost does a great job of making that transition work. This was a solid first effort and I'm looking forward to seeing what he comes out with next.

In a somewhat steampunk Victorian London gone very much awry, Whitechapel has been walled off from the world outside, presumably by the "gods" of the title, Mama Engine and Grandfather Clock, or their minions. The people of this sealed-off bit of London are kept quite firmly in their place by the gold cloaks (minions of Grandfather Clock), the black cloaks (minions of Mama Engine), and the Boiler Men, whose precise allegiance I did not determine, but are definitely not on the side of humanity. A disease is sweeping the people, infecting them with a machine plague entirely unlike those the term is usually used to describe by nanotech-era writers - this causes people to bleed oil, and grow gears, and become virtually unkillable. And eventually, they lose themselves in the machine...

The plot here follows an underground group, each with his own reasons for disliking the status quo, in their attempt to bring down the powerful creatures ruling Whitechapel. The plot is fast-paced and fairly gripping, and one does come to be fairly invested in the plucky rebels and their battles. The structure of the thing is a little flimsy, but I'm not so sure that really matters so much in this case, given that it's a fast read, and the pace doesn't really leave one much chance to dwell upon the possible plot holes. Recommended as a vacation book or for other circumstances in which entertainment is key. Not recommended for critical reading practice.

In case you were wondering, "Whitechapel Gods" is a steampunk book. The first 5 words of the story are, "With a hiss of steam..." Glad the author got that out of the way right up front.

I'm 2/3 through this book and decided to check out the Amazon reviews to see if I'm the only one who thinks it's an underwhelming, derivative effort. I'm not. Someone here noted that it rips off "Matrix." It also seems to rip off Joe Kelly's "Steampunk: Manimatron" comics (2000), and even Joss Whedon's "Firefly" TV show (Oliver, like Mal, was involved in a failed rebellion against the powers-that-be and now heads a "crew" that includes a whore and a strongman and who takes on illegal jobs to make a living; there are certain lines or moments in the book which remind me a lot of Firefly, but the book lacks Whedon's excellent storytelling skills, plot, and character development).

Not to say that being derivative is necessarily bad -- J.K. Rowling became the richest person in England that way. But the writing in "Whitechapel Gods" is not that good. It's difficult to follow, especially when it starts going into dream sequences and surreal meanderings (I'd compare it to H.P. Lovecraft, but it's not that good). The story lacks character development (if Dickens had written something like this, it would have been stunning), and I wonder if the author's ever been to England at all -- the story seems to lack the richness of personal experience in that regard. As someone else here noted, it could have been anywhere in England, or anywhere in the world.

As a fan of the steampunk style, Michael Moorcock (sometimes referred to as the "grandfather of steampunk") and various steampunk movies -- and as an adornment artist who's been making and selling steampunk and Victorian inspired jewelry for a few years -- I thought I should read some of the fiction, too. Well, this isn't the best book to start with. But, it's still an interesting read. As I turn the pages, I keep thinking over and over how this -- in the right hands -- would make a great movie.

› Go to Amazon.com to see all 25 reviews  3.4 out of 5 stars