Pax Britannia - New Reviews!

Even though the first Pax Britannia novel was published almost ten years ago, some people are still coming to the series for the first time. And when it's someone who enjoys the stories they devour the lot pretty quickly, thanks to the wonder of eBooks.

One such reader is Bob Marlowe who has recently posted reviews of all the Pax Britannia books - Al Ewing's as well as mine - and here's what he has to say about them.

Unnatural History
"A readable style which flows along nicely with enjoyable characters... Very enjoyable evocation of a pulp style and there are plenty more to come. A recommended read."

Leviathan Rising
"Here we have a cocktail of Agatha Christie, Titanic, The Poseidon Adventure, the X-Files and dear old Voyage to the Bottom of the Sea and with Green's enjoyable pulpy style, it's a good read."

Human Nature
"The story itself is quite simple but well structured (things in the prologue that seem irrelevant are revisited later) and the good pulpy style of Green makes for a well paced roller coaster."

Evolution Expects
"As ever, a cocktail of monsters, steam punk and nods to well know characters & stories etc. including this time a Bond like board meeting scene, a character named Brundle after the 1987 version of The Fly and a bit of Talons of Weng Chiang amongst others... This series shows no signs of letting up, both novel and novella are a well-paced read, guaranteed to liven up any journey to work."

Blood Royal
"The writing is of the usual high standard with a monster infested St Paul's Cathedral especially well described... I love this series -and am sad I've less than halfway to go to the end."

Dark Side
"I had the feeling Jonathan Green had as much fun writing this as I had reading it. There's the usual tributes to films, book et al that he's enjoyed , the First men in the Moon and Voyage dans la Lune and every chapter takes its name from a film e.g. The First Men in the Moon, Sphere... These stories will never be on the Booker Prize shortlist but the Booker winners I've read were never this much fun!"

Anno Frankenstein
"Naturally this is a blockbuster mix that we have come to expect of monsters and set pieces and does not disappoint, Green handling all the ingredients with his usual skill."

Time's Arrow
"The influences here are Edgar Allen Poe's Murder in the Rue Morgue, The Island of Dr Moreau and The Phantom of the Opera, characters names including Moreau and Leroux. The new characters work well and the story races along at Green's usual pace."

If you're yet to sample the delights of the Pax Britannia steampunk universe, you can buy the books and eBooks here.

Human Nature - a new review

Thanks to David Kenyon for this:

Another exciting chapter in the Pax Britannia series by Jonathan Green... Yet again I wasn't let down by a fast paced novel full of action set pieces. I wasn't sure what to expect from this one to be truthful as the first act deals with the theft of the Whitby mermaid and offers some great action as Quicksilver searches for the thief in a pastiche of 'Oliver', but with monkeys and some Holmesian references as well...which I enjoyed.

Jonathan is like a magpie, collecting gems of literature and giving them a steampunk twist... I adored the second act and read it very quickly as I couldn't put it down. I've always loved a monster story and love body horror and this series has given me some great monsters to visualize in my mind.

The author also does some abominable things to his hero... What I loved about this act was that my favourite character Nimrod had a chance to shine...

As I've said before, if you want some fabulous monster writing in a world of steampunk, dashing and daring characters you will love this series. I'm already into the next book Evolution Expects and it's gotten off to a great start.

You can pick up your copy of Human Nature here, or buy it along with Unnatural History and Leviathan Rising as part of The Ulysses Quicksilver Omnibus here.

The Pax Britannia eBook 'Box' set

What do you get the eReader owner in your life, who doesn't already own the Pax Britannia novels in eBook form already? Why, the Pax Britannia eBook 'Box' set of course.

From now until the end of the December you can get 30% off the first three eBooks - Unnatural History, Leviathan Rising and Human Nature - when who purchase them together from the Sony Reader store.

The Ulysses Quicksilver Omnibus (Vol.1) - a new review

Reviewer Nathan Brazil has contacted me to let me know that he's posted a (very detailed) review of The Ulysses Quicksilver Omnibus (Vol. 1).

He has very positive things to say about Unnatural History and Human Nature but clearly loved Leviathan Rising.

Here are a couple of my favourite bits from the review:

On Unnatural History: "Throughout this work the author amuses with alternate tech, such as Ulysses Quicksilver's personal communicator; a brass and leather mobile phone, an Overground train network in Londinium Maximus, mechanical bobbies, and Beefeater-drones with clockwork craniums."

On Leviathan Rising: "...the real star here is the story behind the man-made Kraken. This has been well thought out, and has a terrific pay off. Leviathan Rising was, for me, streets ahead of its predecessor in terms of storytelling, and was just about perfectly paced."

On Human Nature: "From this point the story rattles along like a British Rail train with imminent brake failure, incorporating a desperate industrialist trying to escape the prison of his disease-riddled body, and a mad German vivisectionist. Some of what is portrayed is on the vomit-inducing side of gruesome, but definitely serves to keep attention glued to the page."

And on Vanishing Point (the novella that appears at the back of Leviathan Rising): "The best of these is... "Vanishing Point" which shows what the author is capable of when he allows himself to write more tightly, and with a sharper clarity of focus."

You can read the whole thing for yourself here, or here.

Nathan's soon going to be reviewing the rest of the Pax Britannia books, from Evolution Expects onwards and I can't wait to see what he makes of those...

Pax Britannia - now available on Kindle

Human Nature at the Sacremento Book Review

It's been up a while, but I've only recently come across this review of Human Nature, posted on the Sacremento Book Review.

Equal parts Sherlock Holmes, Oliver Twist, Edgar Allen Poe, and Frankenstein, this Victorian-flavored fantasy manages to cobble together a helter-skelter collection of gas lamp thriller inspired themes into a rollicking modern take on the good old-fashioned penny dreadful.

Set in late 1990s Magna Britannia, an alternate England enveloped in the Smog and closely resembling the set of a Dickens novel, Agent of the Empire Ulysses Quicksilver and his unflappable manservant, Nimrod (a close literary relative of Lord Peter Wimsey’s Bunter and Bertie Wooster’s Jeeves), battle criminal monkeys, crazed vivisectionists, and lousy ale as they attempt to uncover the truth behind the theft of an alleged mermaid specimen in the seaside town of Whitby.

To read the rest of the review, click here.

Pax Britannia at Graeme's Fantasy Book Review

Graeme Flory of Graeme's Fantasy Book Review has faithfully reviewed all of my Pax Britannia adventures published to date. And they've all received very favourable reviews.

Here's a round-up of his reviews along with rankings based on the scores he gave each of them (out of 10).

1st - Blood Royal (9.5)

2nd= - Unnatural History (8.5)

2nd= - Dark Side (8.5)
4th - Human Nature (8.25)
5th= - Leviathan Rising (8)
5th= - Evolution Expects (8)

I'm intrigued to discover how Anno Frankenstein fares when it's released later this year.

Pax Britannia book reviews

Yours in a White Wine Sauce! has some great reviews of most of my Pax Britannia novels.

There's Unnatural History, Leviathan Rising, Human Nature, Evolution Expects, Blood Royal and The Ulysses Quicksilver Omnibus Vol.1. Al Ewing's El Sombra also gets an honourable mention.

Meanwhile, people are feeling the love for Al's Gods of Manhattan here and saying lovely things about Blood Royal here as well.

The Ulysses Quicksilver Omnibus (Vol.1)

The postman struggled to deliver this today...

Opening up the (it has to be said) huge box I was delighted to discover the following lurking inside...

Yes, The Ulysses Quicksilver Omnibus (Vol.1) is here! Weighing in at over half a kilogram and 734 pages it is a hefty tome indeed and the ideal way of catching up with all things steampunk and Pax Britannian if you're new to the series or a late-comer.

Contained within a brand spanking new cover by Simon 'Pye' Parr are the first three Ulysses Quicksilver novels - Unnatural History, Leviathan Rising and Human Nature - as well as two Pax Britannia novellas - Vanishing Point and Christmas Past. And on top of all that, there's also a brand new introduction to the series and the character of Ulysses Quicksilver written by yours truly.

Featuring a wonderful new design for the series by Pye as well, it's available for an astonishingly reasonable £9.99 from Abaddon Books and even features a rather wonderful quote from SFX magazine on the back. You can pick up your copy here.

Human Nature

And if you enjoyed the post-modernist Frankenstein-isms of Human Nature, check this out...

Pax Britannia on your eReader

You can now pick up all of my Pax Britannia books for your eReader. To find out more click here.


One of the most gratifying things about this news item is Andy Severn's comment about the third Ulysses Quicksilver adventure: "I’ve just finished reading the BRILLIANT Pax Britannia book Human Nature..."

Gotta be happy with that!

Pax Britannia ether-penny dreadfuls (that's e-books to you)

I am very excited to be able to announce that Abaddon Books - publishers of the Pax Britannia series - are to produce e-book versions of their titles - starting with the Pax Britannia books!

Already available through Mobipocket are and Unnatural History, Leviathan Rising and Human Nature, along with Al Ewing's El Sombra.

And in related news, Al Ewing (recently voted one of SFX Magazine's Top 50 hottest sci-fi talents) is going to be returning to the world of Pax Britannia next year with the sequel to El Sombra entitled Blood and Thunder.

Watch this space for more details...

Human Nature reviewed in Unscene Magazine

Just to let all you aficionados of dark alternative music and culture out there know that my third Pax Britannia novel Human Nature is reviewed in the summer issue of Unscene Magazine.

Meanwhile its follow-up title Evolution Expects is now available from all better bookshops or right here.

The expectation is over

I arrived home today to discover a parcel waiting for me, sent by those kind people at Abaddon Books, containing none other than my author copies of Pax Britannia: Evolution Expects.

I never lose the thrill of opening a carton of books for the first time and holding the finished product in my hands, feeling the smoothness of the cover, marvelling at the design work and savouring the smell of fresh print.

And the excitement was only increased today because Evolution Expects, as well as being the last book in the first Ulysses Quicksilver story arc is also the first Pax Britannia book to appear in the larger B format (rather than the usual A format).

You can see what a difference it makes in the pictures below, with Human Nature and Evolution Expects shown side by side. It will certainly give the books a greater presence on the shelf, and make them easier to manhandle when it comes to enjoying them.

And on top of all that the designers have come up with a funky new series logo to go on the spine. And there's a little extra for you the reader too. As well as Evolution Expects the novel, there's Conqueror Worm the novella, which takes the world of Pax Britannia in a rather unexpected direction.

So all that remains for me to say is pick yourself up a copy today and enjoy.

Until next time...

The British Fantasy Society's review of Human Nature

A new review of Pax Britannia: Human Nature found its way into my email inbox the other day, from the British Fantasy Society. And very happy I was to receive it too...

PAX BRITANNIA: HUMAN NATURE
By Jonathan Green
Published by Abaddon Books, £6.99
Reviewed by Adam J. Shardlow

Human Nature is rip roaring fun from cover to cover. The second in the Ulysses Quicksilver novels set in the world Magna Britannia, where Britain rules not only the waves but also the world and the stars through its empire and technical know how. Our intrepid hero embarks on a case involving the stealing of the Whitby Mermaid from Cruickshank's Cabinet of Curiosities. Quickly switching the locals from the drinking dens and poverty pits of London's East End to the windswept moors of Yorkshire, this Steampunk novel mixes together Frankenstein and Sherlock Holmes with a soupçon of Jeeves and Wooster a dash of mad German scientist, a pinch of monster hound and the fruit from a beautiful woman to create a heady and yet decadent cocktail. The fop and bounder that is Ulysses is a resourceful and clever character, not too invincible that he becomes boring, riding above the adventure like a dynamic Scarlet Pimpernel whilst his side kick, the dour and yet resourceful man servant Nimrod, acts as the perfect foil. The pace of the novel is break neck, the writing witty and world building well crafted. Included in the novel is an additional Christmas short story, which adds rather than distracts from the main novel.

Pax Britannia review at Falcata Times

If you're a regular reader of this blog, then you're probably already a fan of the Pax Britannia series. But if you're a newbie and you still need convincing, then you could do worse than check out this very pleasing review by Gareth Wilson of Falcata Times.

Human Nature reviewed on Amazon

The 'official' reviews have spoken very favourably of Human Nature (Ulysses Quicksilver's third outing) and now the punters themselves are having their say.

This very positive review by M. R. N. Shackelford appeared on the Amazon site recently:

A delightful tale of derring-do, damsels in distress, Frankenstein monsters, Victorian heroes and dim policemen - this is a sort of dubious offspring of Conan-Doyle and Steam-Punk. We are in the year 1997, but Victoria is still on the throne and the magnificence of the British Empire is undimmed. But although they have "personal communicators" - made of brass, teak and enamel (!) - they also suffer the worse side of the Industrial Revolution - with smog and pollution everywhere, and the poor still live in rookeries and hovels, dressed in tatters. This book follows on from the (equally amusing) "Unnatural History" and "Leviathan Rising", and observes the adventures of our hero - Ulysses Quicksilver - dandy and secret agent... in a "Hound of the Baskervilles" in Whitby adventure - with the occasional Fagin character, and some great names - "Molesworth" the butler scores 10/10, and another character (who only appears for a moment) is called Mycroft, in a nod to Mr. Holmes. This is NOT great literature and the prose does sometimes hiccup in its enthusiasm - but read fast enough you don't notice it. Definitely recommended for that long flight / train journey / weekend with Great Aunt Gloria.

If you've not read Human Nature for yourself yet, why not pick up a copy and see if you agree with Mark's assessment?

Immortalised in print

Long time readers of this blog will already know that Michelle Powell won a competition last year to appear as a character within the pages of Ulysses Quicksilver's most recent adventure, Human Nature.

You can catch her cameo appearance in Chapter One, when Miss Michelle Powell - velocipede driver and budding amateur engineer - visits consulting detective Gabriel Wraith.

Michelle kindly sent me some photos of herself* holding her signed personalised copy of the book, as you can see here.













If you missed out yourself last time, you may be interested to know that I am currently considering running a similar competition this time tied to Ulysses Quicksilver's fifth exciting outing, entitled Blood Royal. So watch this space for more details!

* Apologies to Michelle for the lateness of me posting this. My excuse is that I've been caught up with writing the follow-up to Human Nature, Evolution Expects.

Human Nature reviews

The reviews of Human Nature are starting to come in now. Following on from the one that appeared in Death Ray magazine, there's one in this month's SFX magazine and on Graeme's Fantasy Book Review.

I particularly like the line in the SFX review which says, 'As usual, author Jonathan Green gets mileage out of his monsters, with big action set-pieces that read like Things We'd Like to See in a rip-roaring summer movie if the creature effects were good enough.'

If you'd like to read the whole review for yourself, you need to pick up a copy of the March 2009 edition.

More news from Abaddon

More news from Abaddon Books regarding the first releases from Rebellion's publishing imprint for 2009. Two Pax Britannia novels get a mention, Human Nature (which is out now) and Evolution Expects (due in May). Read all about it here.