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Throwback Thursdays: The Devil Wears Goggles

Welcome to Throwback Thursdays on the Tor/Forge blog! Every other week, we’re delving into our newsletter archives and sharing some of our favorite posts.

Fiddlehead, the fifth book in Cherie Priest’s Clockwork Century series, is here! To celebrate the publication of Cherie’s latest steampunk adventure, we’ve reached back in our archives to October 2009, when she shared the origins of Boneshaker, the first book in her rollicking alternative history steampunk series. Enjoy this blast from the past, and be sure to check back every other Thursday for more!

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Steampunk: The Devil Wears Goggles

Written by Cherie Priest

Pick a genre book—any genre, any book—and the cover will probably provide a satisfactory shorthand for where it ought to be shelved. Wizards, elves, and knights? You’ve got yourself a fantasy novel. Fangs and a matte black background? Horror. And so forth.

But a couple of years ago when I began working on Boneshaker, I couldn’t name many meaningful signifiers that screamed out “steampunk.” Oh there were goggles, sure—but no one seemed to have a good explanation for what the goggles were for apart from leaving a sweaty crease above your eyebrows. The delightful preponderance of Victorian garb was striking and fun, but the gas masks left me scratching my head. Gears made sense, even on top hats, I supposed. Watch chains were shiny, so, you know. Cool.

However, the odd goggle-wearing, retro-dressing, hat-decorating pocket-watch toter might be mistaken for goth at a glance. In fact, my friend Jess Nevins once repeated that he’d heard steampunk is what happens when goths discover brown. While this assessment oversimplifies the matter, it’d be silly to pretend that there isn’t a great deal of overlap between the two scenes.

So. As an aging quasi-goth with a deep-seated interest in steampunk, I wanted to take an honest stab at the genre—giving it legs, or at least giving its stranger elements a literary excuse to complement the fashion imperative.

Boneshaker began this way, as an idle exercise—a noodling experiment. But like so many projects, I had no idea when I began exactly how far it would take me… or how weird it would get.

I started out with only a few concrete demands: I wanted this story to be American, and not London gas-lamp; I wanted to write about people, not about a world-setting; but I needed for the people to be symptomatic of that world-setting.

Also, I wanted zombies.

The world came first. Nineteenth-century America was strange enough without any interference from yours truly, but I imagined it as if the Civil War had lingered—and the west was not incorporated, or organized. I thought of Texas, and how it might have remained a republic. I wondered how the Confederacy could’ve held on, and how the Union would’ve restructured, and what the war would’ve looked like decades down the line—when most of the men who’d started fighting it were dead, and their sons were fighting over grievances they were too young to remember firsthand.

Piece by piece the Clockwork Century came together, and on that foundation I found people with stories to tell. I found former slaves and air pirates, criminal overlords and Native American princesses. I found a deranged scientist or two. And eventually I found Briar Wilkes—the widow of a madman, mother of a runaway, and daughter of a dead folk hero.

Boneshaker is her story. And like steampunk itself, Boneshaker is about rummaging through the wreckage of the past and finding something worth salvaging, and maybe even worth celebrating. So if you take a chance on my new book, I do hope you enjoy it. If it’s half as much fun to read as it was to write, I’ll consider the whole noodling experiment a grand success.

This article is originally from the October 2009 Tor/Forge newsletter. Sign up for the Tor/Forge newsletter now, and get similar content in your inbox twice a month!

Grab Bag Sweepstakes

Grab Bag Sweepstakes

Our bookshelves are a little overcrowded right now and we need to make room for new books arriving soon. So, we thought we’d make room by offering up books and more to you! Comment below to enter for a chance to win this prize pack:

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NO PURCHASE NECESSARY. You must be 18 or older and a legal resident of the 50 United States or D.C. to enter. Promotion begins April 25, 2013 at 2:00 p.m. ET. and ends April 30, 2013, 12:00 p.m. ET. Void in Puerto Rico and wherever prohibited by law. Please see full details and official rules go here. Sponsor: Tom Doherty Associates, LLC.

Steampunk Sweepstakes

Sign up for the Tor/Forge Newsletter for a chance to win the following prize pack:

Not Less Than Gods by Kage BakerWith Fate Conspire by Marie BrennanThe Half-Made World by Felix GilmanA Transatlantic Tunnel, Hurrah! by Harry Harrison

The Court of the Air by Stephen HuntThe Kingdom Beyond the Waves by Stephen HuntThe Rise of the Iron Moon by Stephen HuntMainspring by Jay Lake

The Affinity Bridge by George MannThe Osiris Ritual by George MannThe Immorality Engine by George MannBoneshaker by Cherie Priest

Dreadnought by Cherie PriestGanymede by Cherie PriestAll Men of Genius by Lev AC RosenThe Alloy of Law by Brandon Sanderson

About our newsletter: every issue of Tor’s monthly email newsletter features original writing by, and interviews with, Tor authors and editors about upcoming new titles from all Tor and Forge imprints. In addition, we occasionally send out “special edition” newsletters to highlight particularly exciting new projects, programs, or events.

If you’re already a newsletter subscriber, you can enter too. We do not automatically enter subscribers into sweepstakes. We promise we won’t send you duplicate copies of the newsletter if you sign up for the newsletter more than once.

Sign up for your chance to win today!

NO PURCHASE NECESSARY. You must be 18 or older and a legal resident of the 50 United States or D.C. to enter. Promotion begins October 3, 2011 at 12 a.m. ET. and ends November 9, 2011, 11:59 p.m. ET. Void in Puerto Rico and wherever prohibited by law. For Official Rules and to enter, go here. Sponsor: Tom Doherty Associates, LLC.

More giveaways:

2010 Goodreads Choice Awards: Winners

Image Placeholder of - 27 Voting has ended for the 2010 Goodreads Choice Awards. Congratulations to our Tor authors in the following categories!

Favorite Books of 2010
#19 The Way of Kings by Brandon Sanderson

Fiction
#4 A Dog’s Purpose by Bruce Cameron
(A Dog’s Purpose by Bruce Cameron was also recently listed in Bookpage’s Best Books of 2010 at #15)

Fantasy
#1 Towers of Midnight by Robert Jordan and Brandon Sanderson
#5 The Way of Kings by Brandon Sanderson
#19 Spellwright by Blake Charlton

Science Fiction
#3 Dreadnought by Cherie Priest

Goodreads Author
#9 The Way of Kings by Brandon Sanderson
#20 Dreadnought by Cherie Priest

Favorite Cover Art
#19 The Way of Kings by Brandon Sanderson

Cherie Priest a 2010 Spotlight Award winner in Seattle Magazine

Place holder  of - 5Cherie Priest, author of the upcoming DREADNOUGHT has been named a 2010 Spotlight Award Winner in Seattle Magazine!

To read the amazing feature on the lovely Cherie Priest, click here.

DREADNOUGHT is the sequel to Cherie Priest’s steampunk adventure–and runaway hit—Boneshaker.

For more information on Cherie Priest’s Clockwork Century visit our Facebook page today!

Cherie Priest’s Boneshaker wins PNBA Award

Poster Placeholder of - 70Cherie Priest has been selected to win a 2010 PNBA Award for Boneshaker!

The Pacific Northwest Booksellers Association (PNBA) is a non-profit association of (primarily) independent bookstores in five Northwest states, Washington, Oregon, Idaho, Montana and Alaska. The Association produces educational and promotional events and materials for its members, and offers literacy, free speech and author promotional vehicles through its member stores.

Congratulations to Cherie!

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