The Affinity Bridge by George Mann review

George Mann’s debut novel, The Affinity Bridge, is a quirky steampunk melodrama that stumbles along with all of the affability of a 19th-century British lord in his cups.  The main characters in this first book of a series are Sir Maurice Newbury, a secret agent for Queen Victoria, and Miss Veronica Hobbes, his young new assistant.  While this novel is clearly a set-up for the rest of the series, and the author spends some time introducing us to the characters, they also have three mysteries to solve along the way.  Not only is this alternate London full of steam-powered cabs and fabulous airships, but it is also being overrun by zombies.  Newbury and Hobbes must puzzle out the mystery of an airship crash, some mysterious ‘glowing bobby’ murders, and find a missing young man who may or may not have been infected with the zombie virus.

I love tales with this steampunk flair – automatons and steam-powered whatnots surrounded by a sense of adventure and peopled by characters as curious, eager, and affable as a puppy.  My only problem with stories such as these is when the science goes all snazzy, full of bells and whistles and shiny like a new penny – and yet doesn’t seem to flow logically.  I understand that I am in a sort of minority in this instance.  Most people suspend belief when caught up in a story and go with the flow.  I’m all for suspending belief – I read books about magic and vampires and werewolves on a regular basis – but generally I want my science or magic to seem logical to me.  I had some trouble with this in The Affinity Bridge, as the brass automatons seemed to me act against the law of gravity.  This threw me out of the flow of the story a couple of times.  I also had some difficulty with some seemingly out-of-character behavior from the two main characters.

So, does this mean I did not enjoy the book?  Definitely not.  These were just small pieces of the puzzle, and while they tainted my enjoyment a bit, I found the story as a whole to be fairly engaging.  Again, this is a debut novel – the first in a series – and the author is setting his groundwork for the future stories.  It is understandable that not everything is completely without flaw, and the story itself transcended these minor issues.

All in all, I found it to be an agreeably curious mystery, full of interesting characters that I might like to follow around for a while.  Sir Newbury and Miss Hobbes have much going for them, and I have faith that the kinks will be worked out, the spanners polished, and the gears greased up nicely as this series progresses.