What do you think?
Rate this book
White Crow Sequence #3
Left to His Own Devices
SF novel (alternate history of London) with The White Crow and Causaubon, characters from Rats & Gargoyles and The Architecture of Desire.
Contents:
* Left To His Own Devices
* Black Motley
* What God Abandoned
* The Road To Jerusalem
Contents:
* Left To His Own Devices
* Black Motley
* What God Abandoned
* The Road To Jerusalem
378 pages, Mass Market Paperback
First published September 1, 1994
52 people want to read
About the author
Mary Gentle
44 books204 followersThis author also writes under the pseudonym of Roxanne Morgan
Excerpted from Wikipedia:
Mary Gentle's first published novel was Hawk in Silver (1977), a young-adult fantasy. She came to prominence with the Orthe duology, which consists of Golden Witchbreed (1983) and Ancient Light (1987).
The novels Rats and Gargoyles (1990), The Architecture of Desire (1991), and Left to His Own Devices (1994), together with several short stories, form a loosely linked series (collected in White Crow in 2003). As with Michael Moorcock's series about his anti-heroic Jerry Cornelius, Gentle's sequence retains some basic facts about her two protagonists Valentine (also known as the White Crow) and Casaubon while changing much else about them, including what world they inhabit. Several take place in an alternate-history version of 17th century and later England, where a form of Renaissance Hermetic magic has taken over the role of science. Another, Left To His Own Devices, takes place in a cyberpunk-tinged version of our own near future. The sequence is informed by historically existing ideas about esotericism and alchemy and is rife with obscure allusions to real history and literature.
Grunts! (1992) is a grand guignol parody of mass-market high fantasy novels, with orcs as heroes, murderous halflings, and racist elves.
Excerpted from Wikipedia:
Mary Gentle's first published novel was Hawk in Silver (1977), a young-adult fantasy. She came to prominence with the Orthe duology, which consists of Golden Witchbreed (1983) and Ancient Light (1987).
The novels Rats and Gargoyles (1990), The Architecture of Desire (1991), and Left to His Own Devices (1994), together with several short stories, form a loosely linked series (collected in White Crow in 2003). As with Michael Moorcock's series about his anti-heroic Jerry Cornelius, Gentle's sequence retains some basic facts about her two protagonists Valentine (also known as the White Crow) and Casaubon while changing much else about them, including what world they inhabit. Several take place in an alternate-history version of 17th century and later England, where a form of Renaissance Hermetic magic has taken over the role of science. Another, Left To His Own Devices, takes place in a cyberpunk-tinged version of our own near future. The sequence is informed by historically existing ideas about esotericism and alchemy and is rife with obscure allusions to real history and literature.
Grunts! (1992) is a grand guignol parody of mass-market high fantasy novels, with orcs as heroes, murderous halflings, and racist elves.
Ratings & Reviews
Friends & Following
Create a free account to discover what your friends think of this book!
Community Reviews
Displaying 1 - 4 of 4 reviews
September 17, 2021
I like the characters and this one has call-outs to the previous books. It’s technologically really dated; it’s from the 90s, but as it’s alternate history, that isn’t much of a problem. The ending felt rushed and too many plot details unexplained.
November 8, 2018
All things change and we change with them.
August 24, 2007
Red haired women are the best.
May 21, 2013
Delightful fantasy
Displaying 1 - 4 of 4 reviews