Steampunk!

An Anthology of Fantastically Rich and Strange Stories

SSTEAMPUNK_48435_HI_US.inddTEAMPUNK_48435_HI_US.indd i 77/13/11/13/11 9:559:55 AMAM SSTEAMPUNK_48435_HI_US.inddTEAMPUNK_48435_HI_US.indd iiii 77/13/11/13/11 9:559:55 AMAM AnAn AnthologyAAnthAnthologyofFn ologylog ofof FantasticallyFaFFantasFantastican s ic llyly RichRichchandStr an andandnd SStrangeStrStrantrangerangengennggeeS SStories Stortorieoorrieieses

edited by Kelly Link & Gavin J. Grant

SSTEAMPUNK_48435_HI_US.inddTEAMPUNK_48435_HI_US.indd iiiiii 77/13/11/13/11 9:559:55 AMAM This is a work of fi ction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are either products of the authors’ imaginations or, if real, are used fi ctitiously.

Compilation and introduction copyright © 2011 by Kelly Link and Gavin J. Grant “Some Fortunate Future Day” copyright © 2011 by Cassandra Clare “The Last Ride of the Glory Girls” copyright © 2011 by Libba Bray “Clockwork Fagin” copyright © 2011 by Cory Doctorow “Seven Days Beset by Demons” copyright © 2011 by Shawn Cheng “Hand in Glove” copyright © 2011 by Ysabeau S. Wilce “The Ghost of Cwmlech Manor” copyright © 2011 by Delia Sherman “Gethsemane” copyright © 2011 by Elizabeth Knox “The Summer People” copyright © 2011 by Kelly Link “Peace in Our Time” copyright © 2011 by Garth Nix “Nowhere Fast” copyright © 2011 by Christopher Rowe “Finishing School” copyright © 2011 by Kathleen Jennings “Steam Girl” copyright © 2011 by Dylan Horrocks “Everything Amiable and Obliging” copyright © 2011 by Holly Black “The Oracle Engine” copyright © 2011 by M. T. Anderson

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced, transmitted, or stored in an information retrieval system in any form or by any means, graphic, electronic, or mechanical, including photocopying, taping, and recording, without prior written permission from the publisher.

First edition 2011

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data Steampunk! : an anthology of fantastically rich and strange stories / edited by Kelly Link and Gavin J. Grant. — 1st ed. p. cm. Summary: A collection of fourteen fantasy stories by well-known authors, featuring automatons, clockworks, calculating machines, and other marvels that never existed. Contents: Some fortunate future day / Cassandra Clare — The last ride of the Glory Girls / Libba Bray — Clockwork Fagin / Cory Doctorow — Seven days beset by demons / Shawn Cheng — Hand in glove / Ysabeau S. Wilce — The ghost of Cwmlech Manor / Delia Sherman — Gethsemane / Elizabeth Knox — The summer people / Kelly Link — Peace in our time / Garth Nix — Nowhere fast / Christopher Rowe — Finishing school / Kathleen Jennings — Steam girl / Dylan Horrocks — Everything amiable and obliging / Holly Black — The oracle engine / M. T. Anderson. ISBN 978-0-7636-4843-5 1. Fantasy. 2. Young adult fi ction. [1. Fantasy. 2. Short stories.] I. Link, Kelly. II. Grant, Gavin J. PZ5.S798 2011 [Fic] — dc22 2010040742

11 12 13 14 15 16 RRC 10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1

Printed in Crawfordsville, IN, U.S.A.

This book was typeset in Golden Cockerel.

Candlewick Press 99 Dover Street Somerville, Massachusetts 02144

visit us at www.candlewick.com

SSTEAMPUNK_48435_HI_US.inddTEAMPUNK_48435_HI_US.indd iivv 77/13/11/13/11 9:559:55 AMAM For Ursula

SSTEAMPUNK_48435_HI_US.inddTEAMPUNK_48435_HI_US.indd v 77/13/11/13/11 9:559:55 AMAM SSTEAMPUNK_48435_HI_US.inddTEAMPUNK_48435_HI_US.indd vvii 77/13/11/13/11 9:559:55 AMAM Contents

IINTRODUCTIONNTRODUCTION viii Some Fortunate Future Day 1 Cassandra Clare The Last Ride of the Glory Girls 17 Libba Bray Clockwork Fagin 54 Cory Doctorow Seven Days Beset by Demons 93 Shawn Cheng Hand in Glove 108 Ysabeau S. Wilce The Ghost of Cwmlech Manor 142 Delia Sherman Gethsemane 177 Elizabeth Knox The Summer People 212 Kelly Link Peace in Our Time 253 Garth Nix Nowhere Fast 267 Christopher Rowe Finishing School 291 Kathleen Jennings Steam Girl 308 Dylan Horrocks Everything Amiable and Obliging 353 Holly Black The Oracle Engine 376 M. T. Anderson

AABOUTBOUT THETHE EEDITORSDITORS 413

AABOUTBOUT THETHE AAUTHORSUTHORS 415

AACKNOWLEDGMENTSCKNOWLEDGMENTS 421

SSTEAMPUNK_48435_HI_US.inddTEAMPUNK_48435_HI_US.indd vviiii 77/13/11/13/11 9:559:55 AMAM Introduction

rphans use the puppet of a dead man to take control of their O lives. A girl confronts the Grand Technomancer, Most Mighty Mechanician and Highest of the High Artifi cier Adepts. Another girl, who might be from another universe, stuns everyone when she pulls out her handmade Reality Gun. Welcome to fourteen steampunk visions of the past, the future, and the not quite today. Depending on whom you believe, steampunk has been exploding into the world for the last hundred years (thank you, Monsieur Jules Verne) or maybe the last twenty-fi ve (when the term was fi rst used by K. W. Jeter in a letter to Locus magazine). We have had fabulous fun working with this baker’s dozen of authors, investigating some of the more fascinating nooks and crannies of the genre. You’ll fi nd the requisite number of gaslit alleys, intrepid urchins, steam-powered machines, and technologies that never were. Those are the basic accoutrements that no self-respecting steampunk

SSTEAMPUNK_48435_HI_US.inddTEAMPUNK_48435_HI_US.indd vviiiiii 77/13/11/13/11 9:559:55 AMAM anthology could be without, but as we assembled the book (fi ling Introduction down this story here, fi nding the right solder to put these two ideas together there), we discovered that steampunk has gone far beyond these markers. The two Philips (Reeve and Pullman, respectively) brought moving cities and armored polar bears. Alan Moore and Kevin O’Neill’s The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen brought nineteenth-century London to a halt. Cherie Priest introduced zombies (Boneshaker), Gail Carriger introduced vampires (Soulless), and Je^ and Ann VanderMeer brought it all together in Steampunk and Steampunk II. Makers and artists have taken the romance and adventure of steampunk and remixed, reinvented, and remade the genre from whole cloth — and, yes, brass widgets. We’ve spent hours wander- ing through the online galleries on Etsy and Flickr, marveling at the clockwork insects, corsets, art, hats, gloves, canes, modded computers, and even a steampunk house (want!), and we love the DIY craftiness that keeps inspiring more decadent and more useful machines and toys. The continuing reinterpretation of the steampunk idea made us ask the writers for stories that explored and expanded their own ideas of what steampunk could be. So we have a book of mad inventors, child mechanics, mysterious murderers, revolutionary motorists, steampunk fairies, and monopoly-breaking schoolgirls, whose stories are set in Canada, New Zealand, Wales, ancient Rome, future Australia, alternate California, and even the postapocalypse — everywhere except Victorian London.

Kelly Link and Gavin J. Grant

ix

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