Karen Memory

Karen Memory

by Elizabeth Bear

Book

**Disclaimer: I've said it before and I'll say it again, I'm not a book blogger. That particular job requires a lot more work and dedication to a specific media than I'm willing to do. So please, please, please, please direct review requests to the actual book bloggers, which is not me.**

I'm a reader and I'll do what I call reviewing on the things I've read if they match the blog's stated purpose of guiding women who love women to content that matches that description, and Karen Memory fits!

Full disclosure, I am into steampunk, and I am part of a prestigious steampunk writing lineage, so I do have some clout in the genre based on who I was trained by, but also a built in bias for the genre. While you're all in awe, or confused and wondering who taught me to write, I'm going to proceed to lavish a fair amount of praise on this book.

The story follows Karen Memery (not a typo--the character's name is spelled differently than the book's name) a "seamstress" in Seattle in an alternate history of the old west. Seamstress is code for prostitute, although there is a large, mechanical sewing machine that factors heavily into the story and Karen does know how to use it.

I'm a sucker for a good first line:

You ain't gonna like what I have to tell you, but I'm gonna tell you anyway. 

At its heart, Karen Memory is an adventure novel. There's a Jack the Ripper type mystery overlaid on the top of the romance and adventure and steampunk, but it's thin and not the part of the novel that remotely does the most work. Within a few chapters, all the villains are on one side and all the heroes on the other, which is a common organizational technique of adventure, not mystery novels. As a fan of alternate history books, I was more interested in the Pacific Northwest arcana and Lone Ranger stuff than the Jack the Ripper parallels.
 

Not this guy. The real one.

Yep, the Lone Ranger's inspiration, Marshal Bass Reeves, is in the book. The real Lone Ranger was a freed slave turned lawmen in the old west. He did have an Indian sidekick and white horse, but he didn't wear a mask. The fact that the real Lone Ranger was a black man didn't come as a surprise to me since I've watched almost every episode of Gunslingers on AHC, but I'm sure there are people out there taken aback by this fact. Classic white washing of history by the film industry that thankfully Elizabeth Bear didn't continue in Karen Memory.

Speaking of diversity, this book's got it. A love interest from India trying to save her sister, a Chinese heroine working to rescue her countrywomen from the sex trade (yeah, the book takes place post slavery, but those laws have never stood in the way of sexual slavery). There is, of course, Bass Reeves and his sidekick. Also transgender prostitute capable of moving in many worlds is integral in several rescues. It's lovely how well Bear represents the diversity of the Pacific Northwest where worlds converged to head north and take advantage of the Alaskan gold rush. 

The rundown: Steampunk, lesbian romance, alternate history, serial killer mystery, high adventure, gun fights, horse chases, sewing machine battles. If even three things on that list interest you, the book is worth a read.

I give Karen Memory 4 1/2 Steampunk Corsets out of 5: