Dreadnought [Paperback]

Cherie Priest (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: September 28, 2010

Nurse Mercy Lynch is elbows deep in bloody laundry at a war hospital in Richmond, Virginia, when Clara Barton comes bearing bad news: Mercy’s husband has died in a POW camp. On top of that, a telegram from the west coast declares that her estranged father is gravely injured, and he wishes to see her. Mercy sets out toward the Mississippi River. Once there, she’ll catch a train over the Rockies and—if the telegram can be believed—be greeted in Washington Territory by the sheriff, who will take her to see her father in Seattle.

Reaching the Mississippi is a harrowing adventure by dirigible and rail through war-torn border states. When Mercy finally arrives in St. Louis, the only Tacoma-bound train is pulled by a terrifying Union-operated steam engine called the Dreadnought. Reluctantly, Mercy buys a ticket and climbs aboard.

What ought to be a quiet trip turns deadly when the train is beset by bushwhackers, then vigorously attacked by a band of Rebel soldiers. The train is moving away from battle lines into the vast, unincorporated west, so Mercy can’t imagine why they’re so interested. Perhaps the mysterious cargo secreted in the second and last train cars has something to do with it?

Mercy is just a frustrated nurse who wants to see her father before he dies. But she’ll have to survive both Union intrigue and Confederate opposition if she wants to make it off the Dreadnought alive.

Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly

Starred Review. An intimate, well-crafted portrait of a nurse on a mission adds depth to this exceptional Civil War steampunk thriller, the self-contained sequel to 2009’s Locus Award–winning Boneshaker. Mercy Lynch, recently widowed and taxed to exhaustion by caring for Confederate wounded in Richmond, must cross the war-torn nation to reach her estranged father, who lies dying in the Washington territories. After her dirigible is shot out of the air, Mercy joins Horatio Korman, a Texas Ranger with an agenda, on the Union’s famous steam engine, the Dreadnought. On their trail are desperate Confederate soldiers and a zombified Mexican legion. The battles and intrigue are entertaining, but the real draw is Priest’s latest no-nonsense heroine, who comes equipped with a full measure of sharp judgment and brutal competence as well as a nurse’s kind (but not saintly) heart.
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From Booklist

Gutsy Mercy Lynch returns in this sequel to Boneshaker (2009), which begins with her working as a nurse in a Richmond hospital in a strangely extended American Civil War. Her husband has died as a Union POW, and now her father is dying in the Pacific Northwest. She sets out to reach his bedside, first by riverboat and then, from St. Louis onward, by rail. The locomotive Dreadnought is a character in its own right (which reflects the view of “high-tech” at that time), and Mercy also has to deal with hostile Indians, Union and Confederate guerrillas, just plain bandits, and some of her fellow passengers with designs on her virtue and everything else that is hers. The historical setting is finely detailed, the action is nonstop, and Mercy will engage readers of both genders. --Roland Green

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Product Details

• Paperback: 400 pages
• Publisher: Tor Books; First Edition edition (September 28, 2010)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0765325780
• ISBN-13: 978-0765325785
• Product Dimensions: 8.1 x 5.5 x 1.1 inches
• Shipping Weight: 12.8 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 3.9 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (47 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #188,315 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

More About the Author

Cherie Priest is the author of eleven novels, including the steampunk pulp adventures Dreadnought, Clementine, and Boneshaker. Boneshaker was nominated for both the Hugo Award and the Nebula Award; it was a PNBA Award winner, and winner of the Locus Award for Best Science Fiction Novel. Cherie also wrote Fathom and the Eden Moore series from Tor (Macmillan), Bloodshot and Hellbent for Bantam, and three novellas published by Subterranean Press. In addition to all of the above, she is a newly minted member of the Wild Cards Consortium - and her first foray into George R. R. Martin's superhero universe, Fort Freak (for which she wrote the frame story), will debut in 2011. Cherie's short stories and nonfiction articles have appeared in such fine publications as Weird Tales, Subterranean Magazine, Publishers Weekly, The Living Dead 2, and the Thackeray T. Lambshead Cabinet of Curiosities. Though she spent most of her life in the southeast, she presently lives in Seattle, Washington, with her husband and a fat black cat.