Helyna L. Clove

I read this novel for The Self-Published Science Fiction Competition, SPSFC. The following review is my own personal opinion as a judge and does not reflect the views of the team as a whole. Find out more about the competition here and my team, The Space Girls, here, and read all my reviews for the competition here!

THE THREE MUSKETEERS meets GUNDAM in this swashbuckling clockpunk mecha adventure!

He needs a job.

She needs an engineer.

The kingdom needs a hero.

For centuries, the kingdom of Leovaix has been protected by its ancient, towering war machines powered by clockwork and alchemy, piloted by the bravest souls in the kingdom. Journeyman Victor Brinden has studied for most of his life to be one of the honored few allowed to work on these venerable machines, but when his thesis experiment explodes in front of the most powerful man in the Kingdom, his career prospects are left in shambles.

With no other options, Victor enters the employ of Countess Fenvale, a noble with little to her name but a sharp sword, a large dog, and the Huntress, a Cataphract in dire need of repair. It’s a simple If Victor can restore the Huntress, then Lady Fenvale can reclaim her birthright. But what should be a straightforward salvage job grows far more complicated as they soon find themselves facing roving highwaymen, scheming nobles, and playwrights of dubious talent. It’ll take all of Victor’s ingenuity and Lady Fenvale’s valor to make it out alive.

But will even that be enough to carry the day, or will Victor’s career end as explosively as it began?

During the scouting phase of our group, The Cataphract Oath immediately impressed me with its visuals and effortless storytelling. I was intrigued by the Cataphract technology and was invested in Victor’s story, who, after a disastrous thesis presentation, gets an unexpected job offer from a reclusive ex-Cataphract pilot to restore the legendary Huntress and what’s more, help the family to preserve its status and lands. Sword-virtuoso Lady Fenvale seemed like a capable, gutsy co-MC, and I was looking forward to the shenanigans against her meddlesome, annoying cousin, Marquis Maldrinne.

And shenanigans I received for the rest of this short adventure! We had infiltration (sort of), party scheming, nobles being nobles, and a scandalous theatre production. And of course, mecha battles in more than one acts. The story moved quickly, but we still had time to develop character relationships and personalities, as much as one can and should in a fundamentally light, humorous swashbuckling romp. I did wish to perhaps delve more into our main character’s personality and past, but nevertheless, I continued to really like the style of the writing which fit the story perfectly, and Victor, clumsy and somewhat meek but brave and resourceful just when needed, turned out to be a great point of view as well. The impetus of the novel(la?) only broke a little bit for me towards the end, but that also could have been because my reading was repeatedly disturbed around that time.

I enjoyed getting to know more about the Cataphracts and seeing them in action a lot. I was missing a bit more worldbuilding around the kingdom itself, since we mostly focused on the mission of restoring the Huntress and outsmarting the Marquis, but there were a lot of interesting tidbits scattered here and there which suggested the larger world is also built out enough. It was also an interesting twist on classic mecha stories that the story focused on not defeating an external enemy but the internal struggles (and bickering) of Cataphract owners during, essentially, peacetime. I have to admit I did expect to hear a bit more about the external enemy appearing in the first chapter, but turns out that clearly wasn’t the goal of the book. I also did feel a bit sad that the story didn’t progress a bit further than where it stopped in this installment, however, the book is intended to be a part of a series, and I’m sure we will get more intrigue and a satisfying conclusion later. For me, the book balances on the fragile margin between “satisfying ending to the smaller story arc” and “I wish there was more packed into this and not just in the sequel”, but that is probably personal preference territory.

In any case, I can certainly recommend this to all lovers of mecha anime and steampunkish swashbuckling stories! It is a well-written, cohesive experience with many interesting ideas and a roster of cool characters, a quick, entertaining read with the promise of more to come. I’m pretty sure I’ll read the sequel and any more stories that are written in the series.

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