Imagine a world where you can look into the sky and see the glimmering of the brass tracks of the heavens on which the earth revolves around the sun, and if you close your eyes tight and listen closely, you can hear the gears clicking and whirring beneath the crust of the earth.  A world with clockwork craftsmanship is so precise that none can deny the handiwork of God in its creation.

Such is the world that Jay Lake has created in his novel Mainspring.

It all starts in the bedroom of young Hethor, a clock-maker's apprentice, who is visited during the night by Gabriel, the Messenger of God.  Gabriel informs Hethor that he has been tasked with the winding of the mainspring, the heart of the world which literally keeps the planet turning.  If he does not find the Key Perilous and rewind the mainspring the world will halt and unimaginable disaster will befall it.  With those words the angel leaves with naught but a silver feather as proof of his visit.

Desperate to know more about the Key Perilous and seeking aid on his God-given quest, Hethor travels to Boston seeking the sorcerer Willaim of Ghent.  William, however, has other plans in mind in mind for the world.  Hethor is imprisoned, quickly rescued by a mysterious man named Malgus, and pressed into the service of Her Royal Majesty's Navy.  The series of events that follows finds Hethor on a path with no apparent destination, only the sparse words of Gabriel, a key-shaped scar on his hand cut by the feather, and a golden tablet he periodically finds and loses from time to time.

At its heart, Mainspring is a coming-of-age tale and, as such, the only character who means much of anything is Hethor himself.  Though there is a myriad of diverse and colorful characters, each one is disposable and only appears when in direct relation to Hethor and his journey.  Even characters that have important information pertaining to the plot (such as Malgus and William of Ghent) appear only when Hethor is speaking to them, which doesn't occur as often as one would like, since Hethor is kept in a constant state of ignorance and self-doubt as to how he is to complete his mission.  The only other truly important character doesn't appear until the last quarter of the book, Hethor's love interest, Arellya.

The progression of Hethor is the most admirable thing that Mainspring has going for it.  He starts his journey as a lonely, teenage clock-maker's apprentice and ends as a man with power, love, and a beard.

While it may not set a new benchmark in the "steampunk" subset of fantasy, it is an interesting story with a well-developed world that grinds away very much like clockwork.  If you're looking for some pure escapism into a world very unlike our own, Mainspring is right up your alley.

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