Blog Tour: Godspeed





Godspeed
by February Grace
YA Steampunk
Paperback204 Pages
June 18th 2013 by Booktrope 
(first published April 28th 2012)                 

Summary

"What is a heart if not the ultimate clockwork?"

Abigail’s young life was saved by the kindness of strangers: Schuyler Algernon, the man who found her collapsed on cold city streets, and Quinn Godspeed, the doctor who risked everything by breaking the law to keep her fragile heart beating.

As the truth about what she’s become and her feelings for her savior overtake her, Abigail is forced to ask what constitutes life, living, and what dark secrets are contained within Godspeed’s past and the walls of Schuyler’s house.
      

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You can see my review on Goodreads here.




Excerpt

On the night when I first asked for him to explain to me, to really, truly explain to me what it was he'd done to prolong my life, he initially directed my attention to the mantle above the fireplace in his laboratory.
This was the first time my gaze settled upon an elaborate Four Hundred Days Clock, all gears and winding golden parts, turning first one way then the other as the hands ticked away the time… time I was content to spend listening to him talk about anything at all in the world, just so I could continue to hear the sound of his voice.
He took the clock down from the shelf and placed it on the table before me, where my eyes watched the ornate crystal findings grasp hold of and relinquish the light at will, refracting beautifully vibrant colors on the walls, and even upon the bodice of my dress; illuminating the metal of the 'clockwork box’ device he had created and modified just for me.
"What is a heart if not the ultimate clockwork?" he murmured, intensely focused upon the intricate machinery of the timepiece. He closed his eyes, seemingly taken far away from his current location as he whispered, why he felt the question was complete and no more explanation was required. "After all, it is the singular mechanism that keeps the ticking time of the soul."
I realized this was not the first time I had heard him say those words. He had said them in my presence before, when I was only barely conscious and perceiving what little I could process going on around me through the nearly impenetrable filter of pain.
I didn't know if he'd originally spoken the words to Schuyler or someone else; I only knew that when he spoke them to me, they sounded different.
As he opened his eyes again and they locked onto my own, I wondered what it was he really saw when he looked at me: a living, breathing woman, or merely a wind-up doll built to his own specifications who existed purely at his whim.
He knew well enough that I had a physical heart, the question in my mind remained whether or not he would ever understand that heart had real, human feelings, still.
"You see, young woman," he began, as he removed the glass dome which encased the clock and revealed to me the winding, musically aligned parts within. "Just as this must keep proper coordination of its parts to correctly keep the time, so, too, must your body have all parts working in concert in order to keep you alive."
I watched the clock, mesmerized, as the beauty of the mechanism powering it completely captivated me.
"One spring out of alignment, one failing connection to the power source, and the gears would alternately skip and seize; keeping neither proper time nor serving any other worthwhile function. When you were brought to me, the Fever had so damaged the connecting components of your heart that it could no longer remember the cadence it was to properly keep on its own. It needed to be reminded — repeatedly — and sadly, the means I had at the ready to do so exacted a vast toll upon you overall."
He hardly needed to remind me of the toll those 'treatments' had taken, I felt the inward and saw the outward scars of the ordeal daily.
Still, his voice was soothing and hypnotic in a way that surpassed anything I had ever known, and I hung upon his every word.




About the Author

February Grace is a writer, artist, and poet who lives in Southeastern Michigan. She sings in key, plays by ear, and is more than mildly obsessed with colours, clocks, and meteor showers. GODSPEED is her debut novel.






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