Publishing Date: May 24th, 2011
Page Count: 473
Source: bought from local bookstore
Format: Hardcover
Description from Goodreads.com:
In 1897 England, 16-year-old Finley Jayne is convinced she's a freak. No normal Victorian girl has a darker side that makes her capable of knocking out a full-grown man with one punch. Only Griffin King sees the magical darkness inside her that says she's special... that she's one of "them".
Review:
You know its books like this that keep me reading. Books that just utterly make me fall in love and not want to stop turning the pages. I bought The Girl in the Steel Corset a long time ago. It has sat on my shelf for months waiting to be read, but i kept putting it off, because i knew it was going to be good and i wanted to savor it. Well, my guestimations were completely correct, because this novel was amazing.
I loved every butt-kicking second of this novel and i cannot wait to see what will happen next in the sequel. The writing style that Kady Cross has is fantastic. She is really good with describing things and really good at making everything cohesive. There weren't any loose ends. If something small is mentioned in the beginning it is usually followed up on later, for example Emily's robot cat. Kady made a small mention of it and then we finally heard more about it later. Loose ends that you didn't even know were loose were tied in the end lol.
Finley Jayne is independent and doesn't need help, but accepts it. She doesn't need Griffin or his friends for her protection or help, she needs them as family and friends. One of the characters, besides the obvious main characters, that i truly loved was Dandy. Maybe others will fall for him too, or maybe they won't see what i mean, but i just loved his character and could so easily hear him talk in his accent.
There is one critique i have, which i didn't even realize until i was talking with someone in the audiobook industry, is that this could have taken place present day. I don't want to mention names with who brought this up, because it was all in book gossiping nature (haha), but they askes me "When you read it, didn't you feel like it didn't have to have taken place in the 1800's?" In a way i think yes, because to my understanding of steampunk (which could be totally wrong) it does, but at the same time can't authors create whatever kind of genre they want? I mean vampires fall under paranormal, but every vampire novel i have read has a different way for them coming to be, different vampire rules, etc., so i mean if Kady Cross wanted it to be steampunk but happen right now in 2012 she could make that happen. And it would have worked just as wonderfully. She could still have it take place in England and everything, but instead have it happen presently. However, i do love the amazing fancy victorian clothes, old time-y-ness, and everything so im still extremely happy with this book, but i keep hearing that when you review a novel you should always bring something new to the plate with your review instead of just reciting the same thing everyone else says about the novel, so here is my extra side dish lol.
Overall:
I loved The Girl in the Steel Corset. It honestly makes me want to try every book that is steampunk, and makes me want to go out and buy some of those extremely cute steampunk clothing items you can find online. I love that Finley is independent and doesn't need Griffin to be there, she just wants him to be. I also loved Dandy's character. I do agree that this entire story could have taken place in present day, but i also still love it just the way it is. Kady Cross is definitely one of my author heroes/Gods and i am just so happy that i finally picked up this book and SO happy that i met her in person afterwards at BEA this year!
Rating: ♥ ♥ ♥ ♥ ♥ 5/5
*Cover photo, publishing date, and description are from goodreads.com and have been linked back. This novel was bought by me from a local bookstore. Everything else is my original work*
