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Review: K.W. Jeter’s Infernal Devices
Posted on: May 8, 2011
- In: K.W. Jeter | recipe | steampunk
- 13 Comments
Infernal Devices, by K.W. Jeter
copyright 1987, republished in 2011 with a new introduction and afterword
where I got it: purchased new
why I read it: it’s the April book club book for my local SF reading club. and who doesn’t like Steampunk?
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Interested in Steampunk but not sure where to start? Looking for some adventure? I’ll save you the trouble of reading this entire review by simply saying that K. W Jeter’s Infernal Devices is one of the best executed novels I’ve read in a long time, and I easily expect it to be one of my top reads for the year. I guarantee you will enjoy it.
In a handful of recently published “steampunks” that I’ve read, the steampunk elements are simply window dressing. The story is an adventure, a mystery, and in more cases than not a thinly veiled romance, with a handful of gears, airships, and steam engines thrown in so it can be called steampunk. I’m an elitist snob: pulling shit like that is a major turn off. So, as an elitist snob, it thrills me to say that Infernal Devices is the genuine article. No window dressing, no airships just for the sake of airships, no thinly veiled anything. Infernal Devices drips with authenticity, invokes a proper Victorian gentleman’s strong dislike of the unknown, reeks of dank dark drinking dens, and invites you to get lost in a watchmaker’s workshop brimming with beautifully constructed clockwork devices.
George Dower never knew his father well. Raised outside the city by an Aunt, he knows his father, the famous inventor, through reputation only. After a churchly disaster, George keeps his head down and merely attempts to keep his father’s workshop in business. This proves difficult, as although George can fix a basic watch that needs nothing more than winding, the workshop collects more dust than commissions.
When a strange looking man delivers a complex clockwork device that needs fixing, and offers payment in advance with a strange gold coin, George takes the man’s money before realizing this commission is far beyond his understanding, and that the dark skinned man never gave his name. Read the rest of this entry »
by popular request, here is that recipe for Pumpkin biscuits that I’ve been teasing everyone with. Not exactly biscuits, not exactly cookies or scones. . . . but quick & easy, perfect for breakfast, and not horribly unheathy. And they warm you up on cold winter mornings!
Pumpkin Biscuits
Makes about 20
preheat oven to 350, grease or line a cookie sheet.
dry ingredients 
1 1/2 cups flour
1/2 tsp baking powder
1/2 tsp baking soda
heaping 1/2 tsp cinnamon
1/4 tsp nutmeg
1/4 tsp powdered ginger
1/4 tsp salt
1/2 cup granulated sugar
wet ingredients
1 cup canned pureed pumpkin
2 tbsp canola oil
1 egg
1/2 tsp vanilla
about 1/3 cup chocolate chips (or more!)
whisk together dry ingredients in a big bowl. add all the wet ingredients, then mix very well. drop by heaping tablespoon onto cookies sheets and bake at 350 for 15 minutes. let cool on racks. makes about 20.
Sorry I haven’t got a photo of the finished product, we ate them all!
the Little Red Reviewer 
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