Clockwork Heart

Written by Dru Pagliassotti

Narrated by Kate Rudd

Flight is freedom, but death hangs in the skies...

Taya soars over Ondinium on metal wings. She is an icarus, a courier privileged to travel freely across the city's sectors and mingle indiscriminately amongst its castes. But even she cannot outfly the web of terrorism, loyalty, murder, and intrigue that snares her after a daring mid-air rescue. Taya finds herself entangled with the Forlore brothers, scions of an upperclass family: handsome, brilliant Alister, who sits on Ondinium's governing council and writes programs for the Great Engine; and awkward, sharptongued Cristof, who has exiled himself from his caste and repairs clocks in the lowest sector of the city. Both hide dangerous secrets, in the city that beats to the ticking of a clockwork heart.

Books in the Trilogy:
- Clockwork Heart
- Clockwork Lies: Iron Wind
- Clockwork Secrets: Heavy Fire

About Dru Pagliassotti

Dru Pagliassotti is a professor of communication at California Lutheran University, where she teaches media theory and practice. She published and edited The Harrow, an online literary magazine for fantasy and horror, from 1998-2009, and she currently runs The Harrow Press, which publishes horror anthologies.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Brilliance Audio
• Release date: Mar 15, 2012
• ISBN: 9781441863713

Dru Pagliassotti

Druann Pagliassotti teaches at California Luthernan University and has been running her webzine, The Harrow, for over ten years. She enjoys traveling, adores iguanas, and can't fix any of her four broken pocket watches. Clockwork Heart is her first novel.

Reviews for Clockwork Heart

[maureene87 · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

by Dru Pagliossotti

The story of Taya, the icarus (basically just a winged messenger), and the unexpected turns her life takes after she rescues an Exalted.

I wasn’t expecting to love this book. The cover art was bad, it seemed like it might veer in a kind of trashy direction. Anyway, whatever the reasons, I was expecting to read it and not be highly impressed.

I was wrong. While it never astounded it me, it was an entirely enjoyable story, with some very well-written bits. I especially enjoyed the main characters. The mystery aspect wasn’t incredibly strong, but I’m not sure that it was meant to be. Instead we were given the growing relationship between two people from very different backgrounds (but different in a way that worked, as opposed to inducing eye-rolling and exclamations of “Oh, come on“).

And then there was the worldbuilding. It was fantastic. From the first introduction of the city and society I believed it. I believed the caste structure, I believed the language and the different groups which had developed. Pagliossotti sold her creation like crazy. In fact, as much as I enjoyed the story and the characters, I think the worldbuilding was what made the book for me.

I did also appreciate that, while there are mentions of lovers and this clearly is not a chaste society, that didn’t necessarily mean that we had to have steamy explicit scenes.

I very much hope that we’ll have a sequel to this some day, or at least another book set in the same world.

Book source: public library
Other links: Leila’s review; review at Angieville; book’s page
Book information: Juno Books, 2008

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Clockwork Heart by Dru Pagliossotti: This may be the book that surprised me the most for the year. I was expecting it to be okay, maybe, and instead I ended up really liking it and immediately going back to re-read the best bits. I loved the world Pagliossotti created, and I’m really happy to hear that there’s a sequel in the works. [2010 in books]

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Clockwork Heart by Dru Pagliossotti: A re-read, because I enjoyed it the first time. Enjoyed it again. I believe there’s a sequel in the works, which is nice, as long as it’s good. [March 2011]

[kkisser_1 · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

The story embodied great elements of steampunk, but took it into a new world order set in a caste system, instead of Victorian England. The evolution of the current world with it's current restrictions, technology advances, and backwardness steams from lessons learned from past wars. The story focusing on a young Icarus, a mail courier who uses armature wings, who gets sucked into a terrorism plot after rescuing an Elated (upper caste) woman and child. Pagliassotti weaves the adventure, mystery of a terrorist plot on a country with light social commentary and great descriptions of mechanical flight armatures and deferential engines.

[kmartin802_1 · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

This was a great fantasy story set in a steampunky sort of world. Taya is an icarus who flies on metal wings and is made more buoyant by carrying blocks of ondinium. She works as a messenger in this society which is rigidly sorted into castes. She is part of a caste that than mingle with all castes. She has dreams of being a diplomat who travels to other lands. One day she rescues two members of the Exalted caste who are in a wireferry accident and is attacked coming back from her sister's wedding by spies from Alzana who would like her wings. She is saved by a mysterious clockwright who is an exile from the Exalted class. Pretty soon she is up to the tips of her wings in the danger and intrigue that is growing in her city. There are two men involved with her. Alister Forlore sits on the governing council and is one of the foremost programmers of the Great Engine that runs the city. His brother Cristof is the clockwright who rescues her. Alister is the more attractive being a man filled with charm and smooth words. Cristof lacks his brother's charm but has the benefit of being honest. When it appears that terrorists have killed Alister and his brother-in-law - the husband and father of the people Taya rescued from the wireferry accident, Taya and Cristof band together to investigate the murders. I loved the relationship between Taya and Cristoff. I loved the world. Who - besides Cristof who is afraid of heights - hasn't had dreams of flying? Taya has a great job! I liked Cristof's determination to go his own way and his love for his brother. Luckily, this is the first book of a trilogy and I have the other two on my Kindle. I can't wait to see what happens next for these characters.

[plappen_1 · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

This fantasy/romance tale takes place in a very stratified society.Taya is an icarus, a courier (with metal wings) who can move freely between the social classes in the city of Ondinium. A person's class is tattooed on their forehead; only through reincarnation can a person rise in class.One day, Taya saves an Exalted (members of the elite class) and her son from what could have been a mid-air disaster. There is a growing terrorism problem in Ondinium; was this their handiwork? Her heroism attracts the attention of Exalted Alister Forlore, a member of the ruling council (he is also very handsome). He also writes computer programs for the Great Engine, the analytical engine that helps to run the city. He has written a program that is supposed to predict a person's most compatible mate. Taya also meets Alister's brother, Christof. He is a sarcastic you-know-what who has renounced his Exalted status and lives in the Ondinium equivalent of the inner city.Tempting as it is, Taya knows that having any sort of intimate relationship with an Exalted is a really bad idea. A few days later, an aircar in which Alister was supposed to be riding explodes in midair. There is no chance for a definite identification of the dead, but everyone assumes that Alister is dead. It becomes known that someone has been trying to run unauthorized programs in the Great Engine, which is a huge offense, even for an Exalted. Taya and Christof learn, to their shock, that Alister staged his own death, and that his personal-compatibility program is only the beginning of his plans for the people of Ondinium.I totally enjoyed this book. It's got steampunk, and it's got really good writing that is easy to read. It also has a bit of romance. I am very interested in reading the other parts of this trilogy (whenever they are available).

[krau0098 · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

This is the first book in the Clockwork Heart trilogy by Pagliassotti. I have had this book in my to read pile for a very long time and was excited to finally get around to reading it. It was a very enjoyable steampunk fantasy with a lot of mystery and some romance.I listened to this on audiobook and it was well done. The narrator did an excellent job of conveying emotion and I enjoyed her voice. There were a few spots where it was hard to tell who was talking (the voices just weren’t different enough between characters) but aside from that I enjoyed listening to this.Taya is an Icarus, she wears giant metal wings and flies messages around the great city of Ondinium. Her life changes when she spots a failing in the wire ferry lines and ends up rescuing a woman and child from the Exalted caste of citizens. In an effort to thank her the Exalted draws Taya into her life and Taya gains a celebrity-like status. Suddenly Taya finds herself not only embroiled in high level politics but also trying to solve a mystery involving murder and theft. I really enjoyed this steampunk mystery. There are some wonderful steampunk elements in the story, the characters are engaging and interesting, and the world-building is well done. There is a complex caste system that was well described. I also really loved the city of Ondinium and how is has multiple layers and runs off of analytical engines.The book is mostly a mystery. Taya is following a series of accidents and coincidences to try and figure out what is going on. There is a bit of a romance as well, but I didn't really feel like this book was a romance per-say (not sure why it is advertised as such).Taya is an awesome character. She is curious and determined but never gets too serious. She doesn’t know when to stop and constantly runs herself into the ground trying to solve problems.I also really enjoyed the character of Cristoff. He is an Exalted that left the caste to become a clockmaker among the lower caste. He is such a noble, honest, and geeky type that I just loved him. This was an engaging read that I enjoyed. My only complaint would be that the story went a bit long, I think it would have worked better if it had ended earlier. There is some humor in here as well, which was fun.I also have a very specific complaint as a chemist. At one point the character smells an ammonia-like smell and identifies it as methanol...totally not accurate. Methanol smells a lot like rubbing alcohol and absolutely nothing like ammonia. I know...I know a small quibble but it bugged me.Overall this was a great book and I really enjoyed it. This book had some fantastic world-building, lots of fun steampunk elements, and very engaging characters. It is mostly a mystery with a bit of romance. I would recommend to fans of steampunk novels that involve a lot of political intrigue. I definitely plan on reading the last two books in this series.

[mmillet_7 · Rating: 2 out of 5 stars]

Chosen to become an icarus at age seven, Taya has spent her life as a messenger of the skies. Icarus fly on feather-light wings made of the precious metal ondinium, delivering mail throughout the three provinces of Ondinium: Primus, Secundus, and Tertius. As a way to protect its citizens, Ondinium has been divided into a many-layered social structure teeming with rules and codes of behavior, ranging from the lowest manual laborers to the highest or Exalteds who must wear heavy robes and masks in public to protect their purity (!). As an icarus, Taya is granted the unique position of residing outside of the different castes in order to fulfill her duties as a messenger.When a cable car malfunctions, Taya is on hand to rescue an exalted and her son which unexpectedly puts her directly in contact with the exalted's family - including the lady's two cousins, the brothers Alister and Cristof Forlore. Both brothers seem interested in Taya and she's not really sure what to make of either of them: Alister the charming and handsome politician or Cristof who has rejected his caste and now fixes clocks in one of the rougher parts of town. Ondinium has always been plagued by spies and terrorists, but when a series of bombings and murders occurs, Taya is forced to work closely with the Forlore brothers who definitely are not what they seem.This was the first Steampunk novel I've tried and it left me feeling a little underwhelmed. The premise caught my attention quickly enough, however, the characters and plot itself failed to really capture, and ultimately more important, keep my interest. I had to really force myself to continue reading and that's never a good sign. My mind often wandered while reading and I ended up creating all these random connections to other things: the province names Primus, Secundus and Tertius reminded me of the brother's names in Stardust and I kept thinking about the 2000 election and the eternal debate over torn chads every time the Great Engine's programming was explained. (Ondinium uses a type of punch card to run a steam-powered computer/engine.) Taya as a character held much promise on the surface: a girl who files around on metal wings who can cross class lines is a pretty good start, but she just never took flight for me. She had her moments, but I kept wondering how the story would have been handled if another author had written it.Since one of the components of Steampunk seems to involve romance, I was hoping for a good love story at the least. Again I was disappointed as I never really felt any sort of connection between either of the Forlore brothers and Taya. Not to mention the continual awkwardness of two brothers falling for the same girl. Eek - I wasn't buying it.Please don't take this to mean it was all bad - there were plenty of interesting scenes with promise. Overall, I just felt like the story could have been a little tighter. On the plus side, I loved the cover: the wings, the girl with the gear in her chest - awesome. I just kept hoping the story would measure up...

[laurenbethy · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

Follows Taya Icarus, a girl who flies around delivering messages with the use of metal wings. The steampunk theme and visions of a metallic city is really awesome. The characters are all fun and love-able. I love this book--its mysterious, funny, and sometimes sentimental. Well rounded and amazing!