Happy B Day to Charles Dickens, Jules Verne, & Thomas Edison this week- Steampunk Style

The winner of the Blogging Contest from 02/10/11
is Abigail-Madison Chase
She won the Steampunk Ray Gun
Congratulations!

What a great week to read and write and think about Steampunk. February 7th, this Monday, was Charles Dickens Birthday, then Tuesday, February 8th was Jules Verne’s Birthday, and this Friday, February 11th is Thomas Edison’s Birthday and National Inventor’s Day in the U.S. To celebrate it all, I’m having a blogging contest today. Post a comment and include your email so I can contact you. From the comments, I’ll draw a winner for a papier-mâché, mock brass painted, Steampunk Ray gun. So please comment and feel free to post questions as well.

For anyone unfamiliar, Steampunk is a type of alternate history or you can say historical Sci-Fi based on the industrial age and the technological age occurring together. It's written in the spirit of H. G. Wells and Jules Verne. If you ever watched the Wild Wild West TV show or the movie - that's steampunk. For the most part it's set during the Victorian Age, sometimes in the American west. You can have magic and paranormal elements and most of the Steampunk/Romances coming out do, but you don't have to.

The latest cross genre of romance that’s all the rage is Steampunk. I find it an incredibly fun genre to write. Steampunk has also exploded into our culture with fashion, both clothes and jewelry. Also gadgetry, as many people love to build steampunk machines including cars. Steampunk music and movies are also hot right now. Simply Google, the word steampunk to glimpse the variety of items included in what has become for some people, a way of life. It’s a yummy genre and once you get a taste of it, you’ll be hooked

Here is the Blurb of my Steampunk/Romance, As Timeless As Stone:
In peril for her life, the Priestess Seshat turns herself to stone in ancient Egypt. Centuries later, Ricard, a dashing nineteenth century Frenchman, repairs a broken statue and reads its incantation--unprepared for the gorgeous flesh and blood woman who steps forth.

Seshat is drawn to the brass robots Ricard creates and the glamour of the Victorian age, and most of all to Ricard himself. But the society of his day cannot accept a woman like her. How far will Ricard go to secure her happiness? Is their love strong enough to transcend time itself?



Here is an excerpt:
A plump woman walked in and curtsied mechanically. “Bonsoir.” Tilting her head to one side she stole a slanted look at Seshat.

“Hello,” Seshat answered in Old Egyptian as she stepped up to the roaring blaze in the brick fireplace.

The middle-aged cook turned her head toward Ricard. “Monsieur Dubois, the woman is not dressed.”

“It is Egyptian attire, Charlotte. In her time...I mean in her land, it is appropriate.” He stared with longing at Seshat and at what he thought of as very fitting apparel. “It suits her well.”

His cook cleared her throat loudly and admonished him with her scowl.

He added, “But of course she will be fitted for proper clothes befitting a lady of her station in the morning.”

“As you say, Monsieur.” Charlotte’s brow furrowed as she scrutinized their guest.
Seshat examined the red wallpaper and the paintings in all shapes and sizes encased in gilded frames.

“She will be staying with us for a few weeks,” Ricard paused and mumbled under his breath, “or forever, if I have anything to say about it.”

“Will the lady be dining with us this evening?” Charlotte tugged on her white bib top apron, tied over a full, floor-length solid blue work dress.

“Indeed she will.” His thoughts weren’t on food, he hungered for Seshat. He inhaled the evocative blend of her musky, soft floral scent. As he imagined the taste of her sweet lips and the salty flavor of her skin, his sex grew hard and throbbed. Ricard’s face was hot with embarrassment, he had invited this fine lady, a priestess of ancient Egypt, into his home as a guest and he must restrain these lecherous thoughts.

“Very well, I shall have one of those creatures set another place at the table.” The plump cook returned to the kitchen.

Two small brass men with iron faces and steam pistons rotating on their sides, a large rotating flywheel in each of their shiny chests, and steam spraying from the open stove-pipe top-hats on their heads, sluggishly marched into the room. Each held trays of food. Seshat screamed and ran to the far corner of the dining room. With her back pressed against the wall, she yelled at them, “If you evil beast harm me I shall put a curse on you. May a donkey violate you, a hippopotamus crush you into little pieces, and a crocodile devour what’s left of you.”

“Not beast.” Ricard had to yell over the roar of the steam servants. “They serve a wonderful purpose. You see, as an educated man in the age of enlightenment, I know servants work long hours at dangerous labor and it is wrong for men of any station to be condemned to a life of drudgery. I built these mechanical men to do all distasteful and dangerous tasks, from cleaning, washing, waxing, chimney sweeping and lighting fires, to hauling and lifting. I have only one human servant, Charlotte, and all she does is cook, everything else is handled by my steam servants, even chopping onions and peeling garlic cloves.”

Seshat stepped out of the corner. Her eyes no longer glittered with fear and her body lost thestiffness, the tension, she’d had but a moment before, yet she still held her hands over her ears.

“Oui, they are quite loud.” Ricard smiled and managed to coax her into a chair at the dining table, or it might have been the aroma of Charlotte’s broiled partridges with hot sauce that impelled her to take a seat.

Here’s the book trailer: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gQEOp9l9ZFA

Please post a comment to be entered into the drawing for the Steampunk papier-mâché ray gun. For more on As Timeless As Stone, please visit my website at
http://MaeveAlpin.com and http://www.facebook.com/MaeveAlpin