I don’t often read books by two authors, because I’ve found that it’s very hard to blend the two writers’ styles so that you can’t tell where one leaves off and the other begins. For most of The Difference Engine, the book is done in a straightforward, rationalist style. Then, towards the end, I started seeing surreal, stream-of-conscious elements start to creep in. Normally, I don’t mind a book that has a slippery narrative style–in fact, I like it in some books. But when you try to do both in a book, it just doesn’t work. When I encountered those elements of surreality, my only thought was, “Whaaa?” There may be few rules in fiction, but there are some rules of style that you can’t violate without ruining the effect of your book.
The other thing that bothered me about this book was the ending. Just when I got my hopes up about finally getting to find out what all was going on, the book ends so abruptly that it makes me wonder if the authors just ran out of steam.
This book had a lot of promise–I really liked the premise–but I’m afraid that it just didn’t live up to that promise.