Lord Kelvin's Machine

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Title Lord Kelvin's Machine

Dust-jacket illustration by Jeffrey K. Potter for Lord Kelvin's Machine
Author James P. Blaylock
Illustrator Jeffrey K. Potter
Cover artist Jeffrey K. Potter
Country United States
Language English
Genre(s) Science fiction novel, Steampunk
Publisher Arkham House
Released 1992
Media type Print (Hardback)
Pages vii, 262 pp
ISBN ISBN 0-87054-163-3

Lord Kelvin's Machine is a science fiction novel by author James P. Blaylock. It was released in 1992 by Arkham House in an edition of 4,015 copies. It was the author's first book published by Arkham House. The novel is the third in Blaylock's Steampunk series, following The Digging Leviathan (1984) and Homunculus (1986). A substantially different novelette version first appeared in the Mid-December, 1985 issue of Isaac Asimov's Science Fiction Magazine.

Contents

[edit] Plot summary

Spoiler warning: Plot and/or ending details follow.

In Victorian London, Alice, the wife of scientist-explorer, Langdon St. Ives, is murdered by his arch-nemisis, the hunchback Dr. Ignacio Narbondo. St. Ives and his manservant, Hasbro, pursue Narbondo across Norway. St. Ives then searches for Lord Kelvin's wondrous machine, which allows him to travel through time to confront Narbondo as a helpless child.

Spoilers end here.

Note that the plot description of this book as described in S. T. Joshi's Sixty Years of Arkham House is wrong.

[edit] Reprints

  • New York: Ace, 1992,
  • Sutton, UK: Severn House, 1993.
  • London: Grafton, 1993.

[edit] See also

[edit] References

  • Chalker, Jack L.; Mark Owings (1998). The Science-Fantasy Publishers: A Bibliographic History, 1923-1998. Westminster, MD and Baltimore: Mirage Press, Ltd., 58. 
  • Joshi, S.T. (1999). Sixty Years of Arkham House: A History and Bibliography. Sauk City, WI: Arkham House, 163. ISBN 0-87054-176-5. 
  • Nielsen, Leon (2004). Arkham House Books: A Collector's Guide. Jefferson, NC and London: McFarland & Company, Inc., 137-138. ISBN 0-7864-1785-4.