Sort of a steampunk version of Robert Heinlein’s story Gulf. It’s got pretty much the same story line and raises the same moral issues. Very bloody, by the way.
Like all Baker books, the story is supported by what seems to have been impeccable historical research.
Except: It’s not really steampunk at all. It reads like steampunk, to be sure. But it’s really just an disconnected installment in Kage Baker’s Zeus Company books, so the driving technological force is not early invention but guided intervention from the future.
This short review was originally published on LibraryThing.