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| Perma-Bound Edition ©2009 | -- |
| Publisher's Hardcover ©2009 | -- |
| Paperback ©2009 | -- |
Imaginary creatures. Fiction.
Princes. Fiction.
War. Fiction.
Genetic engineering. Fiction.
The fate of many rests in the hands of an Austrian schoolboy and a British airman, both in disguise. Alek is the son of the recently assassinated Archduke Franz Ferdinand, hiding from European nations hostile to his father. Midshipman Dylan is really Deryn, a girl passing as a boy in order to serve in the British Air Service. Alek has fled home in a steam-powered Stormwalker, one of the great manned war machines of the Central Powers. Meanwhile, Deryn's berth is on a massive airbeast, a genetically engineered hydrogen-breather, one of the Darwinist ships of the Allied Powers. The growing hostilities of what is soon to become the Great War throw the two together, and Darwinists and Clankers must work together if they all want to survive. Two Imperial forces meet, one built with steam and the other built with DNA, producing rich, vivid descriptions of the technologies that divide a continent. The setting begs comparisons to Hayao Miyazaki, Kenneth Oppel and Naomi Novik, but this work will stand—or fly—on its own. (Science fiction. 12-15)
School Library Journal Starred Review (Tue Sep 01 00:00:00 CDT 2009)Gr 7 Up-This is World War I as never seen before. The story begins the same: on June 28, 1914, Archduke Franz Ferdinand and his wife are assassinated, triggering a sequence of alliances that plunges the world into war. But that is where the similarity ends. This global conflict is between the Clankers, who put their faith in machines, and the Darwinists, whose technology is based on the development of new species. After the assassination of his parents, Prince Aleksandar's people turn on him. Accompanied by a small group of loyal servants, the young Clanker flees Austria in a Cyklop Stormwalker, a war machine that walks on two legs. Meanwhile, as Deryn Sharp trains to be an airman with the British Air Service, she prays that no one will discover that she is a girl. She serves on the Leviathan , a massive biological airship that resembles an enormous flying whale and functions as a self-contained ecosystem. When it crashes in Switzerland, the two teens cross paths, and suddenly the line between enemy and ally is no longer clearly defined. The ending leaves plenty of room for a sequel, and that's a good thing because readers will be begging for more. Enhanced by Thompson's intricate black-and-white illustrations, Westerfeld's brilliantly constructed imaginary world will capture readers from the first page. Full of nonstop action, this steampunk adventure is sure to become a classic. Heather M. Campbell, formerly at Philip S. Miller Library, Castle Rock, CO
Starred Review for Publishers WeeklyLaunching a planned four-book series, Westerfeld (the Uglies series) explores an alternate 1914 divided between Darwinists, who advocate advanced biotechnology, and Clankers, masters of retrofuturistic mechanical engineering. Austria-Hungary's Prince Aleksandar is whisked away into the night by trusted advisers; he soon learns that his parents, Archduke Franz Ferdinand and Countess Sophie, have been murdered and that he has been targeted by prowar Germans. Half a continent away, Deryn Sharp successfully passes as a young man to join the British Air Service; her bravery during a catastrophic first flight aboard a genetically enhanced jellyfish (“The creatures' fishy guts could survive almost any fall, but their human passengers were rarely so lucky”) earns Deryn a post on the living airship <EMPHASIS TYPE=""ITALIC"">Leviathan. The fortunes of war lead Aleksandar and Deryn to the Swiss Alps, where they must cooperate or face destruction at the hands of the Germans. The protagonists' stories are equally gripping and keep the story moving, and Thompson's detail-rich panels bring Westerfeld's unusual creations to life. The author's fully realized world has an inventive lexicon to match—readers will be eager for the sequels. Ages 12–up. <EMPHASIS TYPE=""ITALIC"">(Oct.)
Voice of Youth AdvocatesAwakened in the middle of the night, fifteenyear- old Prince Aleksandar, son of Archduke Ferdinand of the Austro-Hungarian Empire, at first thinks he is headed out for some night training in one of the familyÆs Stormwalker war machines. His teachers, however, have entirely different motives for getting the Prince out of the castle. AlekÆs parents have been assassinated, and his life is in danger. Meanwhile fifteen-year-old Deryn Sharp, who studied flight with her now dead father, is so desperate to continue her studies that she has convinced her brother to help her pass as ôDylanö and join the British Air Service. Unlike the ôClankersö of Germany and Austria who depend on machines, the Darwinists of France and England use fabricated beasts (genetically engineered animals) in all aspects of their lives. On a short trip up in a hydrogen-breathing, balloon-like Huxley (a huge animal based on a jellyfish), Deryn flies off course and ends up joining the crew of the whale ship Leviathan. Through battle and circumstance, the two end up becoming friends and find their missions and their lives entwined in this first volume of a new series by the author of the popular Uglies series. Set in 1914, alternate-history science fiction combines well with ThompsonÆs fabulously detailed illustrations but gets a bit of its base science wrong. The inventiveness of the milieu, however, more than makes up for it. The characters are not as engaging or the story as compelling as the many battle sequences, but there is much here to interest fans of ReeveÆs Hungry Cities series or the less-juvenile fantasies of Hayao Miyazaki. ùTimothy Capehart.
ALA Booklist (Sat Aug 01 00:00:00 CDT 2009)Instead of the Victorian era most often found in the steampunk genre, Westerfeld sets his new series in a Europe hovering on the edge of World War I. The ingenious premise is that Europe is divided not only into traditional historical camps, but also into Darwinists, who genetically manipulate animal "life-strands" into beasts and even whole self-contained ecosystems with wondrous capabilities, and Clankers, whose imposing constructions of metal and gears are a marvel of technological wizardry. Deryn Sharp, from Darwinist England, disguises herself as a boy to enlist on the Leviathan, a flying whale-ship, while Prince Alek, recently orphaned son of Archduke Ferdinand, finds himself on the run in a sort of walking Clanker tank. The plot is boosted almost entirely by exciting and sometimes violent fight sequences, but reading about (and seeing, thanks to Thompson's ample, lavish, and essential illustrations) the wildly imaginative creatures and machines provides nearly as much drive. Fans of Philip Reeve's Mortal Engines (2003) or Kenneth Oppel's Airborn (2004) will be right at home in Westerfeld's alternate reality.
Horn Book (Thu Apr 01 00:00:00 CDT 2010)Westerfeld's new series features a mix of alternative history and steampunk. As WWI breaks out, Prince Aleksandar and his advisers flee to the Swiss Alps. Meanwhile, Deryn Sharp, disguised as a boy, is aboard the British airship Leviathan, which crashes near Alek's estate. As the two meet and begin the complicated dance of diplomacy, the story and characters come to life.
ALA/YALSA Best Book For Young Adults
Kirkus Reviews
School Library Journal Starred Review (Tue Sep 01 00:00:00 CDT 2009)
Starred Review for Publishers Weekly
Voice of Youth Advocates
ALA Notable Book For Children
ALA Booklist (Sat Aug 01 00:00:00 CDT 2009)
Wilson's High School Catalog
ILA Young Adults' Award
Horn Book (Thu Apr 01 00:00:00 CDT 2010)
It was a rough landing. Lights streamed past Jonah’s face, an unbearable glare. Some force that had to be more than just gravity tugged on him, threatening to pull him apart from Chip and Katherine, from the Elucidator and the Taser, from his own self. The image that burned in his mind was of his body being split into individual cells, individual atoms. And then that image broke apart too, and he couldn’t think, couldn’t see, couldn’t hear. He could only feel time passing through him, time flipping back on itself, time pressing down, down, down. …
Then it was over. He lay in darkness, gasping for air. Dimly he heard JB’s voice say, “Welcome to the fifteenth century. Good luck.” But he couldn’t quite make sense of the words. It was like hearing something underwater, sounds from another world.
“You’re hiding, aren’t you? Staying out of sight?” It was JB’s voice again, hissing and anxious. “You have to stay out of sight.”
“Darkness,” Jonah mumbled. “Safe.”
His tongue felt too thick to speak with. Or maybe it was too thin—too insubstantial. He didn’t feel quite real.
There was movement beside him. Someone sitting up.
“You’d like to keep us in the dark, wouldn’t you?” Chip accused. “You didn’t tell us anything we’d need to know to survive in the fifteenth century.”
Whoa. How could Chip manage to sound so normal at a time like this? And so angry (which was pretty much normal for Chip)? Wasn’t his head spinning too? Wasn’t his vision slipping in and out of focus? Didn’t he feel like he might throw up if he had to do anything more strenuous than breathe?
“You didn’t even tell us who we’re supposed to be,” Chip continued.
Distantly, as if he was trying to retrieve a memory from centuries ago—no, he corrected himself, centuries ahead—Jonah puzzled over what Chip meant. Who we’re supposed to be … Oh, yeah. The whole reason they were in this mess was that a group of people from the future had gone through history plucking out endangered children. This would have been very noble and kind, except that they began carrying off famous kids, kids whose disappearances were noticed. JB, who seemed to oppose any tampering with history, was convinced that all of time was on the verge of collapse because of these rescues. He and his cohorts had managed to freeze the effects of the rescues—the “ripples,” as they called them—and gone after the missing children. There’d been a battle, and thirty-six kids from history had crash-landed at the very end of the twentieth century.
Chip was one of those kids.
So was Jonah.
For the past thirteen years, though, they’d known nothing about their true identities. They’d been adopted by ordinary American families and grown up in ordinary American suburbs, playing video games and soccer, trading PokÉmon cards, shooting hoops in their driveways. They had no way of knowing that their ordinary lives were ordinary only because they were in Damaged Time—time itself, trying to heal, had kept both sides of the battling time travelers out.
But Damaged Time had ended. And JB and his enemies, Gary and Hodge, immediately swooped in, each side eager to finish what they’d started.
And that, boys and girls, is how I came to be lying in the dark in the fifteenth century, Jonah thought, his mind working a little better now. That “boys and girls” line was imitating someone, someone on TV probably.
Someone who wouldn’t be born for another five hundred years.
A wave of nausea flowed over Jonah. He wasn’t sure if it was because it’d just sunk in that he was hundreds of years out of place, or if it was because his senses were working better now and he’d just realized that the fifteenth century reeked. A smell of mold and decay and—what was that, rotting meat?—surrounded him. And his nose brought him the first fact he was sure of about the fifteenth century: Whatever else was happening then, no one had modern flush toilets yet.
“Where is that Elucidator?” Chip demanded. He was feeling around on the floor now. “JB, you’ve got to tell me the truth. Who am I?”
“Well, it’s kind of a delicate situation,” JB hedged. “We shouldn’t be talking at all right now, until you’re sure that no one else can hear us. …”
His voice trailed off to just a whisper, which Jonah could barely hear. Why was Jonah having so many problems? He’d been holding the Elucidator—he ought to be able to tell Chip where it was. But his hands felt too numb to be sure if he was still clutching anything or not.
Meanwhile, Chip seemed perfectly capable of sliding his hands all around, groping all along the stones of the floor. He nudged first Jonah, then, apparently, Katherine. Jonah could hear her moaning softly, as if she felt every bit as miserable as Jonah did.
“So help me, JB. If you don’t tell me who I am, right now,” Chip fumed, “I’ll scream so loud that people will hear me in two centuries!”
“No, don’t,” JB begged. “I’ll tell you. Just be quiet. You’re … you’re …”
“Yes?” Chip said, his voice rising threateningly.
“It’s hard to pinpoint the date, exactly, since the three of you took the Elucidator, and that may have thrown some things off, but I think it’s probably safe to say, given when you should have landed, that you’re … um …”
“Tell me!”
“I think, right now, you’re the king of England.”
© 2009 Margaret Peterson Haddix
Excerpted from Leviathan by Scott Westerfeld
All rights reserved by the original copyright owners. Excerpts are provided for display purposes only and may not be reproduced, reprinted or distributed without the written permission of the publisher.
It is the cusp of World War I. The Austro-Hungarians and Germans have their Clankers, steam-driven iron machines loaded with guns and ammunition. The British Darwinists employ genetically fabricated animals as their weaponry. Their Leviathan is a whale airship, and the most masterful beast in the British fleet.
Aleksandar Ferdinand, a Clanker, and Deryn Sharp, a Darwinist, are on opposite sides of the war. But their paths cross in the most unexpected way, taking them both aboard the Leviathan on a fantastical, around-the-world adventure….One that will change both their lives forever.