Heart of Steel

It’s week #2, which can mean only one thing: time for Heart of Steel, book #2 of Meljean Brook’s Iron Seas series!

For those who missed last week, I’m going to do one book from Iron Seas each week in November. I’ve unofficially dubbed this as “Steampunk Month”! So, go ahead and read last week’s post about book #1, The Iron Duke. I’ll wait. No, really, I’ll wait.

<Twiddles thumbs. Gets some tea. Sees plant in a corner, realizes the plant hasn’t been watered in weeks, panics. Waters the plant.>

Okay, now that we’re all caught up, let’s get into it!

You can check the official blurb here.

Heart of Steel (Iron Seas Book 2) by [Brook, Meljean]

The characters we all know and love from The Iron Duke appear in Heart of Steel, which is nice. This story focuses on Yasmeen, captain of the Lady Corsair airship, and Archimedes Fox, treasure hunter and adventurer extraordinaire.

Yasmeen is a mercenary and will do almost anything that is dangerous and profitable. In the first book, she helped Mina and Rhys and managed to remain a mystery. She also threw Archimedes off her airship when he tried to take control. Now she must visit Archimedes’ sister, Zenobia, and apologize for possibly killing him. She has kept something of his that is quite valuable: a da Vinci sketch. She is willing to share the profits with Zenobia in an effort to make amends. But, from the beginning, her visit does not go as planned.

Archimedes, despite Yasmeen’s best efforts, is alive and well and waiting for his chance to reclaim what he has lost on her airship. Also alive and well: his crush on Yasmeen. He was infatuated with her in The Iron Duke, and he is persistent in Heart of Steel. He is also deep in debt and needs to recover the da Vinci so he can pay off his debts.

Unfortunately for Archimedes, he is not the only one desperate to recover the sketch. Unfortunately for Yasmeen, someone will kill most of her crew and burn her airship. With no money, no airship, and plenty of secrets, they will work together to reclaim what they have lost. Ever the opportunist, Archimedes will use every moment to lay claim to Yasmeen’s heart. Their adventure goes beyond what either of them signed up for and is, perhaps, the most action-packed story in this series.

I loved this book as much as the first one, but for different reasons. Yasmeen is a tough, no-nonsense, all-business, anti-emotion kind of gal. Except she’s not just an ordinary gal, because this is a steampunk series and she’s been . . . modified. Her goal is to make as much money as possible, to obey no rules, and to live freely in the clouds aboard her airship. When Meljean Brook named the book Heart of Steel, she wasn’t referring to the male character. Archimedes is the opposite: he’s full of nonsense, even his clothes are flashy and over the top, and he embraces all his emotions. They are an unlikely pair, but their story is beautiful and they temper each other wonderfully.

The steampunk runs amok here, too: zombies are thriving, some radio towers are not yet destroyed (leaving some of the population under Horde control), the airships practically epitomize steampunk, and there all sorts of wonderful – albeit strange – inventions popping up. And, of course, the characters we glimpsed in The Iron Duke appear in Heart of Steel and are just as enjoyable the second time.

As an extra bonus, this book could be read as a standalone if you do not have time – or access – to read the first book. While the characters are familiar from the first, and some of the background might be helpful, the story is complete in Heart of Steel so that reading it out of order is not detrimental to understanding the plot.

Overall score: 9/10 .

 

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