The Windkey and the Lamplighter

I will admit, right up front, that it is easy to be seduced into liking a heroine who bears your name.
Especially if she spells it correctly.
However, keeping that bias in mind, this book is still delightful—my favorite since Swordspointe.

Panegyric done with, for now, the book is written as a sequence of letters between two girls (Kate and Cecy/Katherine and Cecelia) in a post-Napoleonic England where magic is real. The setting is very similar to that of Susanna Clarke’s Jonathan Strange and Mr. Norrell, but since the narrators are female (and therefore wrapped up in the upper-class social scene rather than the academic) it also feels a little like Jane Austen. Cecy and Kate’s adventures are more… well, more adventurous than any of Austen’s heroines. Without losing any of the characteristic femininity of the setting, they manage to explore a very convoluted scheme. (It does not hurt that both Cecy and Kate are cast from the tomboyish-for-the-time, scholarly, intelligent mould, rather than the “delicate flower” one. Since all the narration is first-person, and our heroines are very busy with the plot, only a very little time is dedicated to the goings-on of Society.)

Interestingly, the authors’ notes in the back indicate that Wrede and Stevermer wrote this novel entirely by accident. Apparently Wrede “badgered” (her words) Stevermer into playing a Letter Game. Both women got caught up in the lives of the characters (who can blame them? Kate and Cecy are neat!) and, when they reached the obvious conclusion, realized that they had written a book. They admitted to only light editing, which is impressive if true—the letters read very well together, and there is some very elegant foreshadowing.
I was Not At All Surprised by the ending, though many of the ways they arrived there were quite surprising and enjoyable. My only complaint is that the climaxes of the two halves of the story arrived right on top of each other and seemed a little rushed. I’m not sure what could have gone between them without disrupting the ending, though, so it’s a minor nit to pick.

I am quite looking forward to the sequel, “The Grand Tour”. I picked it up first, browsing at Pandemonium, and only thanks to a friend browsing my bookshelves at a party did I discover that it was a sequel before I spoilt myself by reading them in the wrong order. I am exceedingly grateful to have discovered them this way, and I strongly recommend reading this one first.