Clockwork Angels

Ignore the recommended age range on this book -- it's being discriminated against for being a comic and having some fairy-tale elements. It ISN'T a children's book. Not at all."Clockwork Angels" is one of Lea Hernandez's Texas Steampunk series of graphic novels. As such, it is set in Texas (duh!) and describes a semi-Victorian society filled with magic and strange technology. It's a loose sequel to a previous story, "Cathedral Child," but it's not necessary to read the previous book to understand this one. (Trust me. I still haven't read "Cathedral Child," but after reading "Clockwork Angels" I intend to get my hands on it posthaste!)Stripped of complications, the story has two basic parts. A woman once saw a beast that walked like a man and made seven magical daughters to defeat it. One daughter was tricked into working for the beast to protect her sisters, and another -- the youngest, who has a weak heart -- has forgotten who she is. In the other half of the story, Temperance Bane, a young woman who can read the dead, is asked to read the head of a man named Parrish, who was murdered over a hundred miles south of where his head appeared -- yet his head was discovered at nearly the same time as his body. There are unexpected consequences to this reading.Eventually Temper and her companion Amy flee south to Parrish's home town, where the two halves of the story come together. Along the way we encounter mysterious cloaked women, fights on moving trains, mythical animals, long-lost relatives, a touching love story (between two women; if that disturbs you, perhaps you should avoid the book), kidnappings, and a cleverly discovered secret.I have only two quibbles with the book. First, the scene leading up to the discovery of Sacerdote's secret is a bit unclear, particularly with regard to Temper's internal dialogue. Second, though Hernandez's black and white art is lovely -- sort of a mixture of shoujo manga and Art Noveau -- it can be a bit hard to tell various characters apart at first. But these are minor difficulties. Overall, "Clockwork Angels" is a wonderful story and definitely worth your time.