Hello there. My name is Beau Schemery and I’m the author of The
Seventh of London out now from Harmony Ink Press. This is my first young
adult book. I’ve written other stuff but it was under a pseudonym. (If
you’re interested in my alter-ego, he publishes through Harmony’s parent
company.) The Seventh of London is an action-adventure story that takes
place in a slightly alternate Victorian London. It’s a steampunk book.
A lot of people don’t know what steampunk is still. It’s basically an
aesthetic, more advanced technology re-imagined with a Victorian
sensibility.
But it’s also an attitude. That’s where the punk comes in. It’s about
fighting back. The Victorians had some pretty rigid ideas of what was
right and proper. Steampunk is about flying in the face of that and I
thought it be a perfect fit for a young adult novel. Because what kid
doesn’t want to rebel against the authority pressing in on them? I know I
did.
For the record, I’m a writer but I’m also a reader. And I like to
read young adult novels. It seems to me that people are more willing to
be creative when they’re writing for a younger audience. I think that’s
great. But I try and inject that creativity into everything I do, but
that’s not what I’m getting at here. I was reading a lot of
steampunk-themed young adult novels in the months preceding me writing
The Seventh of London. And let me tell you, I was disappointed. Many of
them were trite and cliché with one-dimensional characters and no real
personality. And the punk was nowhere to be found.
That’s when I decided to write Seventh. I wanted to write a story
that put the punk back in steampunk with characters that were young but
respectable, characters that didn’t just float along helpless as things
happened around them. Seven is a young man with a troubled past but he’s
taken his destiny by the horns. He’s shaping his own future. And he’s
decided to fight against the horrible conditions that the poor children
of London are forced to endure.
It doesn’t stop with Seven either. Even my secondary characters in
this book turned out to have a strength that I found surprising. Rat was
only supposed to appear in one scene and he ended up becoming an
integral part of my plot. Waverly and Annie, Seven’s oldest friends were
created to give Seven a richer backstory and both of them stepped up
and lent a hand in the accomplishing of Seven’s goals. I’ve put a lot of
work into making strong characters that I think not only kids but
adults can respect as well. I hope I managed it. You’ll have to judge
for yourself.
Below you’ll find the blurb and an excerpt from the book. If you want
to buy the book you can get it here
http://www.rainbowebooks.com/store/product_info.phpproducts_id=9601.
You can follow my blog:
beauschemery.wordpress.com, follow me on Twitter
or Tumblr: @hedbonstudios or hit me up on Facebook and let me
know what you think of the book. Thanks to Pants Off Reviews for having
me today. I’ll be guesting on The Armchair Reader blog on the 5th and
this weekend I’ll be appearing at the Scranton Comic Convention. If
you’re in the area, stop by and say hello. Enjoy! –Beau.
Blurb: After his parents and family die, Seven escapes his factory
job. By wits and will alone, he survives in a London divided into the
affluent Fairside and the squalor of London's industrial Blackside,
where many struggle to eke their existence out of despair. But Seven has
to fight for more than just food and shelter.
All over Blackside, a secret cabal of prominent citizens and the
mysterious Mr. Kettlebent are snatching children. Rumor has it a wizard
is controlling the queen, and the country's most notorious villain is
the only one who wants to stop him. Seven is determined to find out why.
Hired by the criminal Jack Midnight to steal the evil wizard's
spellbook, Seven soon discovers the mystery runs deeper than he
suspected. But events spiral out of control, and it isn't long before
the intrigue sweeps Seven into its deadly current.
Excerpt
SEV pulled the collar of his secondhand military coat up and
wrapped his scarf tighter to block the cold November wind whipping
through the streets of London’s Blackside. Sev hated the cold almost as
much as he hated the smoke-heavy air this side of the city. Victoria had
the slums cut off in 1861. Just before the death of Albert. In whispers
they called that period the great spiral. Sev didn’t get the reference,
but he understood the intent. The queen’s mum died, and things started
to go wrong. Now it was 1865, and Sev slipped in and out of the throng
on King Street. He’d been following the man in the stovepipe hat for a
few blocks, blending into the shadows to observe his prey. The
once-crimson military jacket he wore was almost black with wear from
years on the street, but that suited Sev just fine. He knew what it felt
like to get noticed. It hurt more often than not, and Sev’d had enough
hurt for two lifetimes.
The man Sev trailed was tall and oddly built. His arms seemed too
long for his body; his legs towered, but he moved with mechanical
purpose. He wore goggles beneath his stovepipe hat and had a beard as
black as night to match his clothes. Sev had been watching the man for
more than a week now and was completely intrigued by the dark man’s
strange errands. Something about the man’s movement seemed wrong. Sev
couldn’t explain it, but he knew to trust his instincts, and there might
be money in it for him if he told the right person. Sev needed money if
he ever wanted to escape Blackside, and he desperately wanted
freedom. He’d heard stories of the colonies and how someone with
strength and determination could make a living despite the circumstances
of his birth. If there were even a chance that was true, it was a
chance he was willing to take. The man looked toward the shadows that
hid Sev, and Sev pulled his newsboy hat down to shield his eyes. He
looked in the window of the bake shop, feigning interest in the window’s
contents. Glancing at the emerald-green eyes of his reflection, he
pushed his too-long burgundy locks behind his ear before he allowed his
gaze to dart back to the dark stranger. He waited for the gangly man to
turn the corner before leaving his perch to follow.
Sev had grown up on these streets. His parents emigrated in 1845 like
many others during the potato famine in their homeland, and Sev was
born a few years after. He could barely remember how happy he’d been as a
small child with his family. Although he remembered being branded like
it was only yesterday. Funny how the pain could remain so vivid while
the contentment faded so easily. Sev escaped after four years of hellish
labor and horrific circumstances. Freedom should inspire pleasant
feelings, but when he thought back to that day in 1861 when he’d escaped
and took Lord Fervis’s eye, his chest tightened with guilt and regret.
Sev barely remembered his mother. She’d died in Fervis’s factory when
Sev was scarcely nine.
The city was more of a mother to him now, and he knew her streets,
could dash along them without thought and know exactly where he was at
any given time. Sev prided himself on not being seen. The skill was born
of necessity: trying to avoid detection by the Coal-Eaters, Scotland
Yard, and Fervis’s Footmen, Blackside’s own police force. Sev spent more
time in shadow than in light and excelled at remaining unnoticed. It
kept him alive. He stole some things he needed, sold information to get
things he couldn’t, all the while trying to set something aside for his
escape. Not to mention trying to stand up for the factory orphans,
making sure those who tried to take advantage of them met with
unfortunate accidents. If only someone had been there for him and his
siblings. It wasn’t an ideal existence, dashing from shadow to shadow
and avoiding observation, but it beat living in the workhouses and
factories like Fervis’s Auto-Matic Cobblery, which sprang up in
Blackside, and which Victoria was rumored to have encouraged. Sev would
rather die than return to a place like that, and he had no intention of
dying. The young Irishman knew, without a doubt, after what he’d done,
showing his face anywhere near a factory would be a death sentence.
Sev wasn’t sure if the queen’s intentions were good when she
established London’s factory district, and he didn’t care. It was what
it was, but as soon as the filth the industries spewed into the air
started to encroach on the affluent portion of the city, she’d
commissioned giant fans to be placed along
the division, keeping
the filth in the air over the filth in the streets and away from the
nobles and high society. Sev paused on the edge of a roof, hitching up
his oversized trousers, reminding himself to tighten the bracers on his
shoulders. He regarded the stranger beyond the toes of his boots, which
he’d mended more times than he could remember while desperately keeping a
lookout for a new pair. The thought brought memories of his father, and
Sev swallowed against the swell of feelings still strong after so many
years.
The dark man dashed down another alleyway, and Sev skipped along the
rooftop following the man’s every move. He loosed the first few buttons
of the double row that led down his jacket despite the chill night. The
garment beneath was filthy, and he longed to switch it out for his other
shirt awaiting him in the small hideout he maintained above the Royal
Museum.
Sev’s ability to avoid detection allowed him to pass easily above or
below the guarded lines between Blackside and Fairside. He didn’t have
much, but he aspired to something more. He managed to slip from his
attic hideout into the museum from time to time and had forced himself
to learn to read, sort of; he still had a bit of trouble. His thoughts
drifted to Henry, the owlet he’d nursed back to health a few months ago.
They shared his attic room. Some other streeters, kids who lived as he
did, had killed Henry’s mother for food, leaving the tiny owl orphaned
and alone. Sev couldn’t allow the tiny creature to starve to death and
had saved the little owl chick. Henry hadn’t left Sev’s nest since.
The dark man ducked into Curtis’s Mercantile, and Sev paused,
watching from above. He observed the tall man purchase an odd variety of
items: cloth, metal, coal, gears, food, water, and oil. The man didn’t
leave with the items, and Sev assumed they’d be delivered later. To
where? he wondered.
He’d watched the man speak with an eclectic group of people
throughout the week as well: the nobleman Sutherland; the criminal,
Midnight; a prominent madam; three floor foremen from various
industries; and a duchess. Sev tried to piece the connections together
but could spot no obvious correlation. The stranger dashed ahead once
more, and Sev lost sight of the man. Sev cursed and forced himself to
run faster, turning the corner only to find an empty wall. The dark
stranger was nowhere to be found. Sev scanned the alley for any means of
egress but detected none. He dropped to the ground. Nothing, he
thought.
He’s just gone. Sev removed his hat and scratched his head.
Someone shouted from the alley’s entrance, and Sev scrambled up a
drainpipe onto the opposite wall.
~Thank You! Beau for stopping by and sharing an awesome excerpt and artwork~
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