About The Affinity Bridge

Welcome to the bizarre and dangerous world of Victorian London, a city teetering on the edge of revolution. Its people are ushering in a new era of technology, dazzled each day by new inventions. Airships soar in the skies over the city, whilst ground trains rumble through the streets and clockwork automatons are programmed to carry out menial tasks in the offices of lawyers, policemen and journalists. But beneath this shiny veneer of progress lurks a sinister side. For this is also a world where lycanthropy is a rampant disease that plagues the dirty whorehouses of Whitechapel, where poltergeist infestations create havoc in old country seats, where cadavers can rise from the dead and where nobody ever goes near the Natural History Museum. The Affinity Bridge is the first novel in a projected series detailing the adventures of Victorian special agent Sir Maurice Newbury and his delectable assistant Miss Veronica Hobbes. The novel is set in an alternative version of Victorian London in which the industrial age has come early and steam technology has revolutionised the British Empire. Victoria is kept alive on the throne by a primitive life support system and her agents do battle with the enemies of the Crown, both physical and supernatural. The Affinity Bridge follows Newbury and Hobbes as they investigate the wreckage of a crashed airship and its missing automaton pilot, whilst attempting to solve a string of strangulations attributed to a mysterious 'glowing policeman' and deal with a zombie plague that is ravaging the slums of the capital. It takes place early in the projected sequence, not long after Newbury has first employed Veronica as his assistant, and serves as an introduction to both the characters and the setting. The Affinity Bridge should appeal to readers of The Dresden Files series by Jim Butcher, The Court of the Air by Stephen Hunt, Mainspring by Jay Lake and Jonathan Strange and Mr Norrell by Susannah Clarke. It is inspired in equal parts by Doctor Who, The Avengers, Sherlock Holmes and The Mummy, as well as any number of classic Victorian novels such as The Picture of Dorian Gray, The Time Machine and Doctor Jekyll and Mr Hyde. As well as being influenced by such classic Victoriana, the novel also draws deeply on many of the current trends in the SF/F genre, including elements of steampunk, discussions about the nature of artificial intelligence and the relationship between science and the paranormal.

About George Mann

George Mann is the Consultant Editor of Solaris Books, the major SF/Fantasy imprint of BL Publishing/Games Workshop. He is the editor of The Solaris Book of New Science Fiction and The Solaris Book of New Fantasy and the author of The Mammoth Encyclopedia of Science Fiction (Constable Robinson), The Human Abstract (Telos), The Severed Man (Telos) and The Child of Time (Telos, with David J. Howe). His short stories have appeared or are due to appear in venues such as Black Sails, Apex Digest, Triquorum and an anthology of Doctor Who stories. He regularly attends the major science fiction and fantasy conventions in both the UK and the US. He lives near Grantham with his wife and son. more

Praise

"An enormous pile of awesome" Chris Roberson, World Fantasy Award finalist and Sidewise Award Winner.

"Mann's imagination has clearly run wild in this quirky and well realised version of the world, and this is no bad thing…It's fun, it's exciting, and Mann has a very agreeable hand that's easy to appreciate…He has a sharp talent for writing and a surplus of enthusiasm for the genre..." SCIFI Now "The author does a superb job of recreating nineteenth century London...a thoroughly engaging story…Excellent world building; captures the Sherlock Holmes feel; never a boring passage. Bottom line: A hugely entertaining book. 4.5 out of 5." SF Signal. "I absolutely loved it" Lou Anders "Fans of Alan Moore's work will likely enjoy Mann's depiction of Victorian asylums, slums, aristocratic soirées and things that go bump in the night." Strange Horizons "Automata, clattering railway carriages, hansom cabs and 'pea soupers', gas lit streets and the doffing of caps, gruff policemen, mad scientists, arrogant industrialists, séances, pentagrams, addictions to laudanum and a few ravening zombies...Mann is at the forefront of the new generation of UK genre movers and shakers." SFRevu.com

“a science fantasy novel that should appeal to lovers of both genres... one of the biggest surprises of the year and I can’t recommend the book enough.” Fantasy Book Critic

“The Affinity Bridge is a carefully plotted and entertaining steampunk mystery, and Sir Maurice Newbury and Veronica Hobbes emerge as engaging characters readers are likely to want to see again—a desire the publisher promises to fulfill with a sequel, The Osiris Ritual, announced for 2009.” F. Brett Cox, SciFi.com