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Isis Unbound
Inspired in part by Mary Shelley's Frankenstein, Percy Bysshe Shelley's, Prometheus Unbound, and the works of Rider Haggard and R. E. Howard, Isis Unbound is set in an alternate history, steampunk version of 1890's Manceastre, Britanniae, ruled by a new governor general related to a descendant of Anthony and Cleopatra, who won the battle of Actium two thousand years ago, and where the ancient Egyptian gods are real. ...Only a god can kill a god. Nepythys has killed her sister, Isis, and therefore the dead cannot pass over to the underworld--their ranks are rapidly swelling and they now roam the streets as zombies. Chief Embalmer Ptolemy Child's two daughters, Ella and Loli, aged eighteen and ten respectively, are being instructed in the secrets of the mummification process, when the dead begin to wake and walk. And eventually lead the sisters to the greatest mystery of Isis, herself... Winner of the Bram Stoker Award for Superior Achievement in a First Novel.
203 pages, Hardcover
First published May 7, 2011
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Displaying 1 - 6 of 6 reviews
May 21, 2017
Ancient Egyptian lore meets steampunk, with plagues, warring deities, and the living dead rising from their tombs. This is the face of pulp fiction reanimated.
This novel is every bit as unusual as it sounds. The setting may originate in what is merely an alternative version of our own world history, where only two deviations separates our reality from this fictional account, yet the difference is positively ginormous!
The first deviation is nothing less than the existence of the ancient Egyptian pantheon as something factual as opposed to mythic; the goddess Isis, deity of the throne, has been particularly involved in the affairs of mortals, molding the progress of history as she saw fit. The second deviation came in 31 CE when Cleopatra and Markus Antonius won the battle of Actium, deciding the fate of the ancient world in favour of the Egyptians as opposed to the Romans. I.e. in Isis Unbound we're presented the late modern world (the year being 1890 CE, to be precise) as it might have been if ancient Egypt still ruled extensive parts of it, including at least nine tenths of Europe.
Steam is the technology of the period and skyscrapers feature heavily in the urban landscape; on the other hand, some of the millennia old traditions such as mummification and slavery still feature prominently in everyday life. Yet, what was a golden era has turned foul. Pestilence runs rampant, decimating the population, and the abundant riots leave blood flowing in their wakes. The blessing of Isis upon the royal lineage was always seen as granting its members rulership by divine right, but in light of recent pandemics and their resulting tragedies a malcontent has grown, and with it the belief that the current ruler has become unfavoured by the deity. Present Empress Cleopatra, the latest of her name, has a hard time keeping her kingdom together and it is to become even more difficult as the dead suddenly decide to return to life – or something resembling life, at least.
The protagonists of the tale are two sisters, Ella and Loli, daughters of Chief Embalmer Ptolemy Child. Their days are spent in close proximity to the deceased they are preparing for the afterlife. Naturally they are among the first to notice as the partially mummified bodies decide they have better things to do than lie around on tables. From there on things spiral out of control, going from bad to far worse, and after that the gods decide to include them in their own problems. Their tale does indeed turn out to become quite an epic one.
Pulp magazines were known for their cheap writing, relying on the sensationalism of the topics to entice buyers. Isis Unbound seems purposefully to follow this general style, not to sell copies but as a form of art. Bird is a self-professed lover of old pulp and with this novel she brings the genre into this side of the millennium. Like how the flaws of a vinyl record gives it character so does Bird's odd penmanship create something out of the ordinary. And the penmanship is flawed, the potential reader should be very much aware of that, but that is how it should be. The notion of quality as being a measure of perfection does simply not hold true for this novel.
The villains would belong just as nicely in an old fashion superhero comic; they are extreme beyond reason, yet need no excuse to be so, and at no point does empathy for the character play any part. Neither does the plot or its solutions excuse themselves in any noteworthy manner – why should it? Did Superman need much excuse to be allergic to kryptonite? (The kryptonite originated as a required plot device in a 1943 radio play because the main actor wanted to go on vacation while the show aired, using the kryptonite as an excuse to have Superman make groaning sounds for a few episodes, which a stand-in could do just as well.) And at times the tale can be pretty explicit – e.g. in the earlier parts of the book a foetus, named Cleo, is extracted from its dead mother so it can be embalmed separately – though the worst details get brushed over. Pulp was supposed to be sensational, but never gory because gore doesn't sell.
Before delving into Isis Unbound one has to decide if one is willing to read this kind of literature; for some readers it will be more hassle than it is worth, yet others will find that it enhances the experience. It is one of very few books in a genre that is mostly dead – yet, as the book claims, sometimes the dead stop being dead, at least for a while. Perhaps, like with vinyl, we're in for a revival of pulp?
This novel is every bit as unusual as it sounds. The setting may originate in what is merely an alternative version of our own world history, where only two deviations separates our reality from this fictional account, yet the difference is positively ginormous!
The first deviation is nothing less than the existence of the ancient Egyptian pantheon as something factual as opposed to mythic; the goddess Isis, deity of the throne, has been particularly involved in the affairs of mortals, molding the progress of history as she saw fit. The second deviation came in 31 CE when Cleopatra and Markus Antonius won the battle of Actium, deciding the fate of the ancient world in favour of the Egyptians as opposed to the Romans. I.e. in Isis Unbound we're presented the late modern world (the year being 1890 CE, to be precise) as it might have been if ancient Egypt still ruled extensive parts of it, including at least nine tenths of Europe.
Steam is the technology of the period and skyscrapers feature heavily in the urban landscape; on the other hand, some of the millennia old traditions such as mummification and slavery still feature prominently in everyday life. Yet, what was a golden era has turned foul. Pestilence runs rampant, decimating the population, and the abundant riots leave blood flowing in their wakes. The blessing of Isis upon the royal lineage was always seen as granting its members rulership by divine right, but in light of recent pandemics and their resulting tragedies a malcontent has grown, and with it the belief that the current ruler has become unfavoured by the deity. Present Empress Cleopatra, the latest of her name, has a hard time keeping her kingdom together and it is to become even more difficult as the dead suddenly decide to return to life – or something resembling life, at least.
The protagonists of the tale are two sisters, Ella and Loli, daughters of Chief Embalmer Ptolemy Child. Their days are spent in close proximity to the deceased they are preparing for the afterlife. Naturally they are among the first to notice as the partially mummified bodies decide they have better things to do than lie around on tables. From there on things spiral out of control, going from bad to far worse, and after that the gods decide to include them in their own problems. Their tale does indeed turn out to become quite an epic one.
Pulp magazines were known for their cheap writing, relying on the sensationalism of the topics to entice buyers. Isis Unbound seems purposefully to follow this general style, not to sell copies but as a form of art. Bird is a self-professed lover of old pulp and with this novel she brings the genre into this side of the millennium. Like how the flaws of a vinyl record gives it character so does Bird's odd penmanship create something out of the ordinary. And the penmanship is flawed, the potential reader should be very much aware of that, but that is how it should be. The notion of quality as being a measure of perfection does simply not hold true for this novel.
The villains would belong just as nicely in an old fashion superhero comic; they are extreme beyond reason, yet need no excuse to be so, and at no point does empathy for the character play any part. Neither does the plot or its solutions excuse themselves in any noteworthy manner – why should it? Did Superman need much excuse to be allergic to kryptonite? (The kryptonite originated as a required plot device in a 1943 radio play because the main actor wanted to go on vacation while the show aired, using the kryptonite as an excuse to have Superman make groaning sounds for a few episodes, which a stand-in could do just as well.) And at times the tale can be pretty explicit – e.g. in the earlier parts of the book a foetus, named Cleo, is extracted from its dead mother so it can be embalmed separately – though the worst details get brushed over. Pulp was supposed to be sensational, but never gory because gore doesn't sell.
Before delving into Isis Unbound one has to decide if one is willing to read this kind of literature; for some readers it will be more hassle than it is worth, yet others will find that it enhances the experience. It is one of very few books in a genre that is mostly dead – yet, as the book claims, sometimes the dead stop being dead, at least for a while. Perhaps, like with vinyl, we're in for a revival of pulp?
April 4, 2016
An intermittently interesting read - set in an alternate history where Antony and Cleopatra won the battle of Actium the two thousand years old Roman-Egyptian Empire encompasses the world (well, probably; the army has Chinese mercenaries but the Americas are not mentioned, I think ). All is not well, however - the dead are refusing to stay down and a series of disastrous harvests, combined with plague, support the view that the patron goddess, Isis, has withdrawn her support. The current Cleopatra visits Manceastre, the economic heart of Britannia, to oversee the interment of the previus Governor-General and install his replacement.
The story initially focuses on the family of Ptolemy Child, the official embalmer, but later includes the Empress and the Commander of her Armies, her new Governor-General and a number of gods and goddesses. It may be the large and disparate cast that creates the problem. The book is not, to be frank, an engaging read. There are a small number of typos but one or two real odd decisions brought me up short several times. Firstly is the dating - which seems to be 'our' Christian calendar so the novel is set in the 1890s (the Krakatoa explosion is mentioned as having taken place in and affected the harvests for several years in the 1880s) rather than the 'traditional' dating from the founding of Rome which would give a date of 2640s auc or even from the founding of the Empire, which would give a date of 1920 or so... Secondly the name 'Alexander' is italicised every time it appears - since this is the name of Clepatra's ship that is acceptable but not when the context indicates that it is Alexnder the Great being mentioned. It might just be that someone decided to do a 'Search and replace' without thinking... These things irritate me!
The story initially focuses on the family of Ptolemy Child, the official embalmer, but later includes the Empress and the Commander of her Armies, her new Governor-General and a number of gods and goddesses. It may be the large and disparate cast that creates the problem. The book is not, to be frank, an engaging read. There are a small number of typos but one or two real odd decisions brought me up short several times. Firstly is the dating - which seems to be 'our' Christian calendar so the novel is set in the 1890s (the Krakatoa explosion is mentioned as having taken place in and affected the harvests for several years in the 1880s) rather than the 'traditional' dating from the founding of Rome which would give a date of 2640s auc or even from the founding of the Empire, which would give a date of 1920 or so... Secondly the name 'Alexander' is italicised every time it appears - since this is the name of Clepatra's ship that is acceptable but not when the context indicates that it is Alexnder the Great being mentioned. It might just be that someone decided to do a 'Search and replace' without thinking... These things irritate me!
unfinished
March 31, 2013I didn’t get very far into this before giving up. Some really dull and clunky passages, a point of view that seemed to wander from a child to a goddess in the course of a paragraph, an Egyptian dynasty that has for some reason adopted a dating system devised (in our world) by a Christian monk in the sixth century; each a brick in the wall that stopped me reading further. Maybe it gets better: there were some good things in the parts I read — the embalming of a pregnant woman in the early pages presents the reader with some exceptionally grisly images.
November 13, 2012
I tried to like this book, but only made it 70 pages in before I gave up. It is horribly written and bounces back and forth between character viewpoints within the some paragraph. The story has promise, but ultimately the writing is such a turn off that reading it is a struggle.
February 24, 2025
Absolutely, abominably, atrociously... poorly written. Did anyone edit this? HAHA, just kidding. It's obvious. Both the pacing and the dialogue are clunky, the story rambles, and much of what is written is just unnecessary, adding nothing. The truly sad part is it could have been at least a mildly enjoyable creepy read, but the lack of proofreading made it a slog, and made me annoyed with people who give bad writing high ratings.
Oh, and it's not steampunk. Yes, there are machines and the word 'steam' appears here and there, but don't fall for that bullshit either.
Oh, and it's not steampunk. Yes, there are machines and the word 'steam' appears here and there, but don't fall for that bullshit either.
May 2, 2012
Loved this book. I think one of the things about it is that I don't think I've ever read such a twist before. Cleopatra and Antony do not lose the battle to Octavian and as such, Egypt becomes a mega superpower. Fast forward to 1800s England where the story is set and where the Egyptians still rule and the egyptian gods still walk the earth.
Displaying 1 - 6 of 6 reviews