The House of Storms (Light Ages) - Hardcover

MacLeod, Ian R.

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 0441012809 ISBN 13: 9780441012800

Publisher: Ace Hardcover, 2005

Synopsis

To save her only son from consumption, Alice Meynell, the great grandmistress of the Telegraphers Guild, makes a bargain with her former lover, a changeling in the land of Einfell, in exchange for a cure, a pact that that could have painful repercussions for her son when he is forced to choose between duty and love.

About this title

About the Author

Ian R. MacLeod was born and has lived most of his forty years around Birmingham in the United Kingdom. He is the author of the novel The Great Wheel and his short fiction has appeared in Interzone, Asimov's, and Fantasy and Science Fiction, and has been widely anthologized and translated. His alternative history novella entitled The Summer Isles won the World Fantasy Award.

Reviews

Starred Review. In MacLeod's brilliant The Light Ages (2003), the discovery of a substance called aether revolutionized technology, ushering in a Victorian age radically different from our own. Now, a century later, the Age of Light has come to an end in this more tightly plotted sequel. Alice Meynell, Greatgrandmistress of the Guild of Telegraphers, is willing to commit murder to establish her own power and assure the future of her tubercular son, Ralph. To save his life, she makes a deal with the Chosen, magical beings so warped by aether that they can no longer live in human society. As Ralph's health improves, however, he falls in love with Marion Price, a servant girl who eventually bears his child. Alice, acting in what she believes is Ralph's best interests, forces them to separate, secretly sending the baby to live with the Chosen. Years pass, civil war breaks out, and Alice, Ralph and Marion pursue their varied destinies. Full of detailed descriptions of landscapes and complex human feelings, this rich, leisurely novel bears some similarities to the more frenetic fiction of China Miéville, though the author's affinity to A.S. Byatt is even stronger. This is a major work by a master writing at the top of his form.
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The successor to the superb Light Ages (2003) depicts MacLeod's alternate Victorian society as more advanced technologically but with magic still strong in it. Alice Meynell, greatmistress of the Telegraphers' Guild, is about ready to turn to magic to save her son and heir, Ralph, from consumption, for all medical remedies have failed. She hopes that the sea air at Invercombe on the west coast of England will help, and she puts even more hope in the magic that may still linger there, centered around a community of changelings. One of those changelings once loved Alice, and a bargain is struck so that Ralph regains health. Consequently, Alice regains the hope of a dynasty. But then Ralph falls in love with a servant girl, and that so threatens his mother's plans that she sets in motion powerful countermagic that in turn threatens the basis of society. MacLeod has again imagined and written superbly, and be it noted that his erotic scenes should be the envy of many of his professional peers. Roland Green
Copyright © American Library Association. All rights reserved

Edition details

• Publisher: Ace Hardcover
• Publication date: 2005
• Language: English
• ISBN 10: 0441012809
• ISBN 13: 9780441012800
• Binding: Hardcover
• Edition number: 1
• Number of pages: 464