OverLondon by George Penny and Tony Johnson has a most intriguing tagline: “A rollocking comic-fantasy whodunnit with a Tudor twist!” and I was approached by the publisher after they saw I was a huge fan of the Rivers of London series by Ben Aaronovitch. I couldn’t say no after I read the book blurb!
Title: OverLondon
Author: George Penney and Tony Johnson
Series: OverLondon #1
First Published: September 12, 2023
Publisher: Swashblucker Press
Genres: Comic Fantasy, Crime
Acquired: from the publisher
*** Thank you to the publisher, Swashbuckler Press, for providing me with an e-copy of this book in exchange for an unbiased review. ***
Priests from OverLondon’s Church of Vengeful Acquisition are exploding. Is the cause divine retribution, ballistic undergarments or something more sinister? If only the city had a professional
private investigator…
Luckily, notorious pirate—turned privateer—Captain Alex Reign, has just narrowly escaped the hang man’s noose to establish the Reign Agency in Drury Lane. She needs cash fast and will take any job, even if failure means facing an inconveniently messy end. But what’s a little danger to a professional swashbuckler?
Armed with nothing but her roguish wit, her reliably unreliable crew and a rogue artificer experiencing a mortal crisis, Alex is convinced they’ll have this crime solved and the reward pocketed by teatime.
To solve their first case, all they must do is survive while navigating rampaging nuns, clockwork horrors, confectionary gangsters, piratical florists, malevolent urchins, military-grade statuary, weaponized blasphemy and sexual whales. How hard can it possibly be?
A whirlwind of fun
If I had to describe OverLondon in just one word, it would be: FUN. This book is so much fun. There’s A LOT going on and it took me some time to wrap my head around everything – the story is set in a fantasy world where cities exist above the cities we know – ie. OverLondon, OverParis, OverManchester – and there are just enough similarities and differences to remind you that the OverLondon world is based on ours, but not really. For example, in OverLondon’s current events, Queen Anne (Boleyn) the Vengeful tore up Henry VIII’s orders for her execution and broke with the Vatican herself when she declared herself a goddess (this alternate timeline is, like I said, FUN).
The characters are also very interesting. The main character is former pirate-turned-privateer Captain Alex Reign, who has to beg, borrow, and/or steal enough money to buy back her airship, which is currently held by the government until back taxes are paid (bureaucracy, it seems, exists in every reality). As we meet more characters in the story, my imagination was running wild trying to picture them – many are human-animal hybrids and thus have features and talents to go along with their mixed DNA.
The story is a humourous balance of history, fantasy, religion, and satire. There is a lot of word-play and sarcasm (my favourite) and there’s a sense of lightness to the whole thing, even though we’re dealing with a very deadly mission.
The mystery of the exploding priests and the overall plot were very well-done and moved along at a quick pace. There is quite a lot of story and world-building done in one book, which is an accomplishment made easier by the humour that kept things from getting too bogged down or boring.
While this book is a standalone story, I’m definitely hoping that this is the start of a long-running series.
About the Authors, George Penney and Tony Johnson
George Penney is a best-selling comedy fiction author (writing as Georgina Penney and Evie Snow), podcaster and cultural omnivore who’s lived in over 20 countries. She was once saved from being a bunny-slipper-wearing historian by an unexpected three-book publishing deal with Penguin Random House. She’s a driven workaholic who spends her time voraciously reading and researching for her next book—when she’s not actively trying to wind up her partner-in-crime and co-writer, Tony Johnson.
Tony Johnson considers writing to be the third most fun thing you can do sitting down, and has co-written multiple best-selling comedic novels with his writing partner, George Penney. In a past life he worked as an engineer, hammering a creative shaped brain into an analytic shaped career. He loves astrophysics, particle physics, science fiction and fantasy, techno-utopianism, excessive complexity and 99.9% of cats.
You can connect with the authors online here:
WEBSITE | FACEBOOK | INSTAGRAM | TWITTER
MY FAVOURITE MONSTER PODCAST | BOHEMIANA PODCAST
Quote from OverLondon
Priests are EXPLODING? What a premise! Excellent review, Stephanie, this does sound like a fun read.