Review: The Girl in the Steel Corset by Kady Cross

I'm having trouble putting images in right now, so no cover photo!)

The Girl in the Steel Corset, Kady Cross

3 stars

Release date: 24th May 2011

Publisher: Harlequin Teen

Genre: YA, Steampunk,  

Pages: 388

In 1897 England, sixteen-year-old Finley Jayne has no one except the thing inside her.
When a young lord tries to take advantage of Finley, she fights back. And wins. But no normal Victorian girl has a darker side that makes her capable of knocking out a full-grown man with one punch.

Only Griffin King sees the magical darkness inside her that says she's special, says she's one of them. The orphaned duke takes her in from the gaslit streets against the wishes of his band of misfits. Emily, who has her own special abilities and an unrequited love for Sam, who is part robot; and Jasper, an American cowboy with a shadowy secret.

Griffin's investigating a criminal called The Machinist, the mastermind behind several recent crimes by automatons. Finley thinks she can help and finally be a part of something, finally fit in.

But The Machinist wants to tear Griff's little company of strays apart, and it isn't long before trust is tested on all sides. At least Finley knows whose side she's on, even if it seems no one believes her

This book got recommended to me a couple of months back so I decided to read it when I saw it in stores. I have to admit-- the cover made me swoon, too.

At first I wasn't really into the novel, but then it got better. I started loving characters-- especially Jasper. (Can I please have, Kady? =3) This is kind of a Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde novel. Finley has two dark sides because her father was a close friend of Louise Stevenson-- author of Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde. Her father took potions and became the inspiration for Stevenson's novel. While Finley's dad was taking the potions, he got her mother pregnant and the chemicals of the potions mixed with Finley's blood or whatever and out turned Finley. She has a darker side and she gets really badass when that dark side is out.

The other characters include Griffin, whose powers I really don't get, Sam, who is super strong, and Emily, who is a genius. Also there is in Jack Dandy, a devious and morally corrupt man who takes a liking to Finley. Oh, and an American by the name of Jasper Renn who has some sort of powers and is amazing with a gun. Did I mention he's a cowboy? All of the characters here are different and very 3D. Finley is a strong and brave character, but she didn't catch my eye like Emily did. Emily is a genius and while she's not a fighter, she makes things that do fight.

So I have to say: reading this book felt like I'd missed some sort of back story or a prequel. A lot of the concepts weren't explained too well and the lack of details made me feel that I'd missed the book before or something. Some of the very briefly explained concepts confused me. I didn't get Griffin's powers, some of the machines, that sort of stuff. Ms Cross, please explain better and more thoroughly! One of the downsides of this was that half of the time I was struggling to understand whatever was happening with the magic and machines, as well as the history.

So this book is quite the badassness. A quirky and new adaptation of the Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde phenomenon, the student in me is eager to talk about this during English because admit it-- Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde is the quite boring (to me at least!) and to read such an adaptation is very cool!

My verdict: While I struggled to understand some of the concepts because of the minimal explanations, I liked this punky and new take on the famous Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde novel. The heroine is strong and brave and the characters are all interesting, especially one cowboy.