Steaming Pistons Steampunk Compendium I: Steam Rising

By Tom Laimer-Read

Welcome to Odnnol, that roguish, rakish, rambunctious place. If you want the full, authentic Odnnol Experience, then look no further. What more splendid adventures could you expect than encountering one of the jovial locals who would happily fleece you of your wallet and all of your wares as soon as look at you, and then expect thanking for the very favour? Why not promenade down one of our quaint, quirky cobbled streets, replete with vagrants, drunks, guttersnipes and thugs, all regaling you with their tales of woe, and out to make a quick bob in the process? Wander through the commercial districts, resplendent with the latest steam-operated mod cons, bedecked with brass bolts and balustrades, gleaming in the gloaming. Then there are the industrial quarters; large, barren wastelands of immense factories scourging the desolate area, puffing smoke into the smoggy sky and billowing bilge into nearby rivulets. By way of relaxation, you can explore the delights and denizens of the laudanum dens, see vituperate vaudeville and incendiary cabaret at the music halls, or take a spin on a pair of steam roller-skates around one of our many public parks and thoroughfares. A more wanton, wayward place you would be hard-pressed to find. Almost as hard-pressed as if you had fallen into a Patent Steam-Powered Automated Trouser Press. And yet, the city is joyful and jubilant with life, teeming with expressions of ecstasy and delinquent delights. What you will find, well, you can decide for yourself, but you will hopefully discover something that piques your curiosity and gives you cause for wonder, even if it is just a Patent Steam-Powered Automated Trouser Press. (They are quite fascinating, if you ask me!) Seriously silly steampunk fun! Enjoy the trip!

• Language: English
• Publisher: Tom Laimer-Read
• Release date: Jun 26, 2014
• ISBN: 9781311121240

Tom Laimer-Read

Tom Laimer-Read is a writer who wants to make writing exciting. Tom went to various state schools in Norwich in various states of consciousness, where he enjoyed reading and not being at school. He was in a few bands that were fun, but didn't get much attention from the national press as they don't tend to report from local rugby clubs and village halls. In the late 1990s Tom headed to Manchester University to study English with a burgeoning love of The Smiths, Stone Roses, Happy Mondays, Joy Division, Inspiral Carpets, The Fall and Buzzcocks, certain that Manchester would be a hotbed of new musical mavericks and a place where more fantastic, original music would emerge. He was wrong. That year the Hacienda closed down, the pills, thrills and bellyaches dried up and the 24 hour party was over, never to be reignited during his ten years there, unlike the large I.R.A. bomb that did ignite and tore through the heart of the city causing widespread damage to it and the psyche of the people (who were already damaged enough) the summer before he arrived.Tom studied comic books, Dada and the contents of his navel, and was also in a few more unsuccessful bands, but became disillusioned with the stagnant music scene, taking up the mic in comedy clubs instead. He encountered many strange creatures declaring themselves to be comedians, and participated in a murky arena where lurked some extremely unusual, unsavoury individuals, moreso than any punk rock set-up could contain.After a while, this also got a bit samey, since the big clubs supported the more boring acts, so Tom went back to music, hooking up with fellow disaffected comedians Steve G., Tom 'Jim the Poet' Faucett and Adam Bowman. They formed The Chainsores and had some legendary performances, most of them seen by very few people. After the band's spectacular demise and a short-lived follow-up, The Casual Vandals, Tom moved back to his home town of Norwich and continued to perform solo comedy, edging in the political direction. Tom performed a show about the danger of I.D. cards at the Edinburgh Fringe called 'Freedom Come, Freedom Go', which not many people saw, and has run alternative comedy nights such as Normal Service Will Be Resumed Shortly and The Dysfunction Room, which were mostly ignored, as his books probably will be too.

Book preview

STEAMING PISTONS

STEAMPUNK COMPENDIUM I -

STEAM RISING

by Philbert Chicory

Dedicated to S.L-R.

Edited by Tom Laimer-Read and published by Let's Rock Publishing in 2014

Copyright 2014 Let’s Rock Publishing

Smashwords Edition

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Contents

A Most Startling Introduction

Steam Rising

Thornfinger - A Cautionary Steampunk Tale

The Chamberpot Crisis

The Big Stench

The Wheels of Industry

Of Inhibitions and Exhibitionists

Afterword

A Most Startling Introduction

Greetings, dear reader. Come closer, closer, not that close, back a bit, yes… there. Now, sit tight, not that tight, yes… that's quite tight enough… and enjoy the woozy steampunk wonders of a forgotten time that may or may not have ever even occurred…

I bring you these words from afar. So far, yet so near. For, as it were, I am a traveller through the dimensions of both time and space, believe it or not, come here to your present day using a very marvellous piece of equipment known as a Time And Space Harpsichord (T.A.S.H. for short). This peculiar device was built by a crazed scientist and friend of the great fantasy author G. H. Whelks, who bestowed upon me the task of bringing these tales to you, which I have presently done. I do not know why he couldn't have done it himself, but he has a lot on his plate. This intriguing machine operates by the user playing an intricate combination of keys on the time harpsichord keyboard, after which they are transported to a designated time and space. Unfortunately, I hit a wrong note and ended up in your reality, so we'll just have to live with that for the time being. Time being bouncy, as it is.

I offer you these recountings of the startling events that took place in my own dimension a few short centuries ago. You may well notice some similarities to your dimension tucked within these tales, yet your reality remains strange and unfamiliar to me. For instance, you do not have the name 'Bharles', as we do, but you call men 'Charles', for some odd reason. Who decides which letters should be used for words where, when it comes down to it? Perhaps in one dimension, the inventor of one of the names was having a fancy to use a letter on that particular day. In your case, they were having a 'C' Day. In ours, a 'B' Day. What a cunch of Bharlies you are! There are certain other similarities and differences, which I am sure you will discover presently.

The centrepiece of the stories that I bring you is the great city of Odnnol itself, that roguish, rakish, rambunctious place. If you want the full, authentic Odnnol Experience, then look no further, you have come to the right person. What more splendid adventures could you expect than encountering one of the jovial locals who would happily fleece you of your wallet and all of your wares as soon as look at you, and then expect thanking for the very favour? Why not promenade down one of our quaint, quirky cobbled streets, replete with vagrants, drunks, guttersnipes and thugs, all regaling you with their tales of woe, and out to make a quick bob in the process? Wander through the commercial districts, resplendent with the latest steam-operated mod cons, bedecked with brass bolts and balustrades, gleaming in the gloaming. Then there are the industrial quarters; large, barren wastelands of immense factories scourging the desolate area, puffing smoke into the smoggy sky and billowing bilge into nearby rivulets. By way of relaxation, you can explore the delights and denizens of the laudanum dens, see vituperate vaudeville and incendiary cabaret at the music halls, or take a spin on a pair of steam roller-skates around one of our many public parks and thoroughfares. A more wanton, wayward place you would be hard-pressed to find. Almost as hard-pressed as if you had fallen into a Patent Steam-Powered Automated Trouser Press. And yet, the city is joyful and jubilant with life, teeming with expressions of ecstasy and delinquent delights. What you will find, well, you can decide for yourself, but you will hopefully discover something that piques your curiosity and gives you cause for wonder, even if it is just a Patent Steam-Powered Automated Trouser Press. They are quite fascinating, if you ask me!

Enjoy the trip!

Philbert Chicory, Time and Space Traveller and Esteemed Author

* * *

Steam Rising

Dear entrusted, and hopefully not encrusted, reader. Settle in, nestle down comfortably (not that comfortably, please!), as we are about to begin. I am Philbert Chicory, your esteemed guide and author, taking you on a tour of the great and illustrious city of Odnnol, that most oddest of oddities, that shining beacon of beauty and despair, that thriving, throbbing place, full of pith and vinegar, salty lasses and unsavoury lads, bulging with goods from all corners of the known world, tangleberries, tagnuts and woozlefruit, ananabs and spinelppae, perpep and ecips and anything that you can lay your hands on. Careful where you're putting that hand now!

It is the early 1800s, the turn of a new, exciting century, with fascinating, fulminating possibilities ahead, racing ever, ever closer. The wonders that await