Michael Swanwick - The Iron Dragon's Daughter

Pros: exoteric and esoteric
Cons: same as above

Picture this: a human girl, a “changeling” who’s been brought into a strange dark universe, is a drudge for the monstrous industrial factory where sentient iron dragons are churned out by a cross-section of enslaved magickal beings: shifters, dwarves, ...

Pros: a wonderful mix of genres and themes, otherworldly yet recognisable setting and real characters.
Cons: none

I must confess that fantasy literature is something that I lost the taste for many years ago, having found it increasingly clichéd, becoming almost a parody of itself. Maybe I was reading the wrong books but everything I read seemed to contain the same ...

Pros: Deep, moving plot in a richly detailed world
Cons: Violence and sex, sometimes juxtaposed

This is a kaleidoscopic novel set in a gritty world of industrial fantasy. The central character, Jane, is a changeling - a human - in a world of dwarves, ogres and sprites. Her mentor is an obsolete Iron Dragon - in this world, a sort of sentient...