Book Review: The Iron Thorn by Caitlin Kittredge

Image (c) Random House Children's

The Iron Thorn (Iron Codex #1) by Caitlin Kittredge
Publication Date: February 22nd, 2011
Format: Library Book

In the city of Lovecraft, the Proctors rule and a great Engine turns below the streets, grinding any resistance to their order to dust. The necrovirus is blamed for Lovecraft's epidemic of madness, for the strange and eldritch creatures that roam the streets after dark, and for everything that the city leaders deem Heretical—born of the belief in magic and witchcraft. And for Aoife Grayson, her time is growing shorter by the day.

Aoife Grayson's family is unique, in the worst way—every one of them, including her mother and her elder brother Conrad, has gone mad on their 16th birthday. And now, a ward of the state, and one of the only female students at the School of Engines, she is trying to pretend that her fate can be different. 

Everyone believes that there's this virus that contaminates everything it touches. It's believed that, once you have it, you can never return back to the life that you used to have. It makes things difficult when your family is known to carry this disease that lays dormant within you until your 16th birthday.

But Aoife's determined to make sure that the same happens for her. She wants her future to be determined by her skills with machinery and not because of her family history. It's the one thing that she knows that she's good at, at least. It helps that she, at leasts, has a close friend to rely on: Cal. He helps her stay grounded... at least as much as anyone can. But when she receives a message from Conrad- her brother- that he needs help, she decides to take fate in her own hand and leaves to find her father back in Arkham.

On the way there, they (being Cal and Aoife) run into someone who can guide them to where they need to go without being detected... at least for the most part- Dean. Despite the conflict that this man has with her closest friend, Cal, to the point of distrusting him, Aoife finds herself becoming really close to him.

Once she makes it back to her father's place, she discovers a lot of secrets that she never expected to find about her family's past. But, most importantly, she gets to find out what happened with her brother Conrad.

There's a lot of stuff that happens in this book- some that I wasn't expecting to read. I knew this would be a steampunk-ish novel but it never really clicked in my head that there would be fey involved. It was a very nice twist of events.

This was a nice read but it wasn't one of my favorite reads. I fell in love with the writing and all the twists and turns that this book took. One of the issues I had with this, however, was that at some points the story felt somewhat... stale. There were many great points, don't get me wrong, but the things in between were just... bleh. Even with the twist involving a certain character, it didn't really make me care for him as much.

Still- this is a creative, imaginative, book. If you're a big fan of the fey lore and steampunk, I'd check this out.

(Originally posted on A Court of Ink and Paper, previously known as Cosying Up With Books)