Felix Gilman’s The Half-Made World is a mixture of steam-punk, fantasy and a western. And it pulls it off brilliantly. Gilman who had previously published two fantasy novels (Thunderer and it’s sequel Gears of the City) has stepped into a hybrid book that many different types of readers will enjoy. Even though I’m not much of a fantasy fan (as I’ve mentioned a few times previously), but I might check out Gilman’s other two books to see if they are as much fun as this one. So what is The Half-Made World?

Liv Alverhuysen is a widowed psychiatrist who’s working in an Eastern University. When she gets an invitation to go to a hospital out West where she can work with patients who have lost their minds, she decides that there is nothing holding her back. Along her journey she starts seeing the battle between the Line and the Gun that she had only heard about previously.

John Creedmoor is an agent of the Gun. His weapon (a gun) has put him in contact with a demon (voice, power, ???) that has given him supernatural ability, but makes demands that Creedmoor doesn’t always like. When the Gun finds out that an old General from The Republic might know about a weapon that can help them destroy the Line, Creedmoor is dispatched out West to capture the General to find the weapon (or at a minimum, keep it out of the Line’s hands).

Lowry is a bureaucrat working for the Line. He keeps his head down and keeps moving forward for them, because that is all he knows how to do. When the Line sends him to capture an old General from a hospital out West, he follows along as best he can

The General was one of the founders and protectors of The Republic. The third-way that lost the war to the Line, but is still remembered and possibly even still exists. The General had a friend with the Hill People who might have had access to the super weapon.

These people collide brutally and often and chase each other across the undeveloped West where neither Line nor Gun has taken hold yet. Creedmoor manages to capture the General and brings Liv along to try and recover his mind (which was damaged by a Line noise weapon). The question start coming along of who is right and does it even matter any more.

Gilman has pulled together steampunk (the Line), western (the Gun), fantasy (the Hill People) and a war (the General) into a wonderful story. The story focuses on our three main characters and we can see how the journey and the battle affects them all. The General is the McGuffin. He might have a secret in his head that is worth the world. Or he might just be a crazy old man who lost a battle and his mind. The promise of the secret is what drives everyone wild and pushes all past the point of no return (literally in many cases). It’s a great story that makes me excited to see what Gilman comes up with next. Highly recommended.