The Osiris Ritual by George Mann (a Newbury & Hobbes investigation: book 2). 319 p.The setting for this series is pretty cool: London, 1902, with airships and automatons alongside horse-drawn cabs and typical Victorian stuff. Queen Victoria is kept alive by strange devices. One of Newbury's contacts, a bookseller with a vast collection of occult tomes, had one eye replaced with a mechanical device. When Lord Winthrop hosts a grand party at his home, the pinnacle of which is the opening of a very unusual mummy case that he brought home from Egypt, his servants are automatons that are designed to look like Egyptian statues. Newbury ends up investigating Winthrop's murder, which ends up tying into his attempt to find a rogue agent. Hobbes is trying to find out whether a stage magician is causing young women to disappear. She keeps trying to interest Newbury in her problem, but isn't too successful until (of course) the cases converge.
Mann's very good at atmosphere, and some of the action setpieces are really cool. However, there's something off-putting to me about his characters. I can't really put my finger on it, but I don't feel any sympathy or connection with the characters at all. Still, I am planning to read the third book (The Immorality Engine).
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