![\"Steampunk,](\"http:\/\/farm8.staticflickr.com\/7151\/6491868963_231c59791e_o_d.jpg\" "\\"Flash")
This free novella is the lead-in to Ms. Buroker\u2019s series The Flash Gold Chronicles.\u00a0 And a fine lead it is.\u00a0 I\u2019ll borrow the author\u2019s synopsis:<\/p>\nThis free novella is the lead-in to Ms. Buroker\u2019s series The Flash Gold Chronicles.\u00a0 And a fine lead it is.\u00a0 I\u2019ll borrow the author\u2019s synopsis:<\/p>\n
\u201cEighteen-year-old Kali McAlister enters her steam-powered “dogless sled” in a race, intending to win the thousand-dollar prize and escape remote Moose Hollow forever. The problem? Fortune seekers and airship pirates are after her for the secret to flash gold, her late father’s alchemical masterpiece.\u00a0\u00a0 With her modified rifle and a pocketful of home-made smoke bombs, Kali wouldn’t normally hide from a confrontation, but taking on a whole airship single-handedly is a daunting task. Unfortunately, the other racers won’t assist her–they’re too busy scheming ways to sabotage her unorthodox sled.<\/p>\n When a sword-slinging stranger shows up, wanting to hire on as her protector, she’s sure he has ulterior motives, but he’s the only one interested in helping her. The question is…why?<\/p>\n An 18,000-word (80 page) novella\u201d\u00a0\u00a0 My review follows:I quickly found myself enamored with the protagonist, Kali: she\u2019s a smart, scrappy young woman left on her own after the death of her scientist father.\u00a0 The townsfolk don\u2019t trust her, some don\u2019t like her much.\u00a0 Buroker manages to meld the tough exterior Kali has had to develop with the vulnerability she feels without coming across as sappy.\u00a0 This really is a wonderful accomplishment.<\/p>\n Cedar appears out of nowhere and signs on as Kali\u2019s helper in a race.\u00a0 Neither trusts the other fully, but they must depend on each other to stay alive: her competitors want her out of the race and air pirates want her father\u2019s secrets.\u00a0 The relationship between these two is peppered with good natured banter, and repressed suspicions.\u00a0 There is a\u2026 let\u2019s call it a hormonal tension, between them that will probably blossom into a romantic entanglement eventually.\u00a0 But for now, this too gets repressed by the suspicions.<\/p>\n The pacing of the story is excellent.\u00a0 Ms. Buroker manages to slip in enough backstory to flesh out the characters quite well enough that we care about them, yet never falls into an expository quagmire.\u00a0 Secrets are revealed, characters grow, the intrigue builds as the story progresses.<\/p>\n This is a steampunk novella, but it is a gentle steampunk story; it takes place in the Yukon around (probably) the late 1800\u2019s and the story involves a steam powered dog sled, a few amazing inventions and an airship full of pirates, but none of this is presented in such a way as to jar you from the scene of a Yukon mining town.\u00a0 It all flows very well and is expertly presented.<\/p>\n Flash Gold ends with an obvious open door to the next book, but this story is satisfactorily concluded; no cliff hanger here.\u00a0 I dislike endings that say to me, \u201cIf you want to know what happens you have to buy the next book.\u201d\u00a0 Flash Gold promised more adventures between Kali and Cedar, but ties up all the loose ends first.\u00a0 A very satisfying read.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" This free novella is the lead-in to Ms. Buroker’s series The Flash Gold Chronicles. And a fine lead it is. I’ll borrow the author’s synopsis: “Eighteen-year-old Kali McAlister enters her steam-powered “dogless sled” in a race, intending to win the thousand-dollar prize and escape remote Moose Hollow forever. The problem? Fortune seekers and airship pirates … Continue reading “Book Review: Flash Gold”<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5],"tags":[3,14,13,36],"class_list":["post-2818","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-share-the-love","tag-books","tag-review","tag-scifi","tag-steampunk"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/pineymountainfoster.org\/thoughts\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2818","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/pineymountainfoster.org\/thoughts\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/pineymountainfoster.org\/thoughts\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pineymountainfoster.org\/thoughts\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pineymountainfoster.org\/thoughts\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2818"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/pineymountainfoster.org\/thoughts\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2818\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":21618,"href":"https:\/\/pineymountainfoster.org\/thoughts\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2818\/revisions\/21618"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/pineymountainfoster.org\/thoughts\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2818"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pineymountainfoster.org\/thoughts\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2818"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pineymountainfoster.org\/thoughts\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2818"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}
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