The Golden Spider: A FREE Historical Fantasy Romance

Anne Renwick

Aug 2016 · Anne Renwick

About this eBook

Enjoy this FREE series starter by historical fantasy romance author Anne Renwick where you'll unravel mysteries and defy conventions in a world where danger lurks around every corner. You’ll find forbidden romance, evil villains and mad science in these gaslamp and steampunk stories...

Mayhem and murder endanger the foggy streets of Victorian London, where secrets and spies hide in a world of gaslamp fantasy.

Lady Amanda blackmailed her way into a prestigious London medical school…

Not the preferred method of entrance, of course, but necessary, for it’s the only way to force Lord Thornton, a professor at the school, to help her perfect her invention: a clockwork spider capable of spinning artificial nerves.

And Lord Thornton is interested… but is he interested in Amanda, or simply the invention that could cure his own debilitating injury? Neither one can trust the other, but both know this: any attraction is a danger, any romance forbidden.

But when a foreign spy steals the spider and uses it to perform grisly experiments on human subjects, they must set aside both their differences and their growing attraction to capture the killer terrorizing the streets of London.

STEP INTO THE ELEMENTAL WEB!

The Golden Spider is the first story in the Elemental Web Chronicles, although all books in the Elemental Web (Chronicles, Tales & Stories) can be read as standalones. For fans of steampunk and gaslamp fantasy romance like SL Prater, AJ Lancaster and Jacquelyn Benson, this is a STEAMY romance with a guaranteed happily ever after for women in STEM and the men who are their match.

Ratings and reviews

Our heroine and hero are student and teacher caught in a deadly struggle with a master spy. And in a growing attraction between them and things might get just a little complicated. This is the first book set in this particular series, although it is also part of the author's larger steampunk world. Still a good place to start. Wow. This one is kind of overwhelming, not because of any one thing, but because of the vast and highly detailed world the author has created. By shear coincidence I am currently listening to an audio book also by this author and it showed me just how well developed the world is. The characters are also many and well developed, including the many secondary characters which adds to the overall feeling the the world is read. As for the writing itself, it is excellent and easy to read, with a complex plot that has lots of intrigue and action, as well as a bit of romance here and there. Overall, this was a highly enjoyable story and I look forward to explore more of this world. Highly recommended. I received a free copy of this book via Booksprout for review purposes.

What a gaslamp steampunk without mystery, murder, and mad scientists? Not a good one that what. Throw as dash of leather corsets and abundance of skin to put the "steam" in steampunk and this little madcap caper will have you smile. Gypsies are being murdered and it's up secret agent Lord Thornton to figure out who it is before more innocence die, but he will have to match wits with one very intelligent female who may hold the key to helping solve the case. He just has to talk her into handing it over without handing his heart along the way. It's a romantic who-dunnit that will have you letting out a sigh of relief by the end. I received a free copy of this book via Booksprout and am voluntarily leaving a review.

I have read every other book in this world, but somehow, I had never managed to make it back to this one. Now I have and I can’t understand what took me so long. I adore this world and the author’s ability to blend fantastical impossibilities with genuine, factual science to the point where you really can’t tell where one ends and the other begins. I loved Amanda and how nearly everything she does is against the grain of society and most of the standards of the genre. I liked Lord Thornton well enough, but I didn’t get a good grasp on all of his motivations, especially in regards to their relationship. I can’t say I was terribly surprised by the revelation of the villain. Though, I don’t know if that’s from a tiny vestigial memory from the books after this or if I’m really just that suspicious. Now that I’m finally fully caught up on the series, I can’t wait for the author to bring us more

About the author

ANNE RENWICK holds a Ph.D. in biology and greatly enjoyed tormenting the overburdened undergraduates who were her students, fiction has always been her first love. Today, she writes steampunk romance, placing a new kind of biotech in the hands of mad scientists, proper young ladies and determined villains.

Anne brings an unusual perspective to steampunk. A number of years spent locked inside the bowels of a biological research facility left her permanently altered. In her steampunk world, the Victorian fascination with all things anatomical led to a number of alarming biotechnological advances. Ones that the enemies of Britain would dearly love to possess.