MG Fantasy review of Skycircus (The Cogheart Adventures #3) by Peter Bunzl

Skycircus (The Cogheart Adventures #3)  by Peter Bunzl
Format:  ARC paperback
Publisher:  Jolly Fish Press 
Number of Pages:  432
Publishing:  February 11th, 2020 (first published October 4th, 2018)
Source:  Publisher 

Opening Lines: "Most people who fall in their dreams wake before they hit the ground."

Lily Hartman is unhappy because today is her fourteenth birthday and instead of getting ready for her party, everyone is busy preparing for an event for her father.  Then a hatbox mysteriously appears on Lily's doorstep, inside is a notebook filled with Lily's late mother's notes about becoming a mechanist and research she was doing on the characteristics of flight.  Included with the present was a cryptic message and an invitation for Lily and two of her friends to attend Slimwood's Stupendous Skycircus.  Hoping to get some answers, Lily, Robert, Tolly and Lily's mechanimal Malkin set out for the circus.  At first glance, the circus appeared to hold all of the excitement that Lily had hoped for, but upon closer observation, Lily and her friends begin to suspect that the child performers are only pretending to be happy.  When Tolly sees a girl performer he recognizes being mistreated, Lily and her friends know they must rescue her.  Instead, they unknowingly walk into a trap and are kidnapped.  Forced aboard the flying skycircus, Lily, Robert, and Malkin must now find a way to save themselves.  

Lily, Robert, and Malkin began their adventures in the first book of the series,  Cogheart.  After Lily's father, a famous machinist disappears, Lily is returned home from finishing school to try and find him.  Much of the steampunk aspects of the Victorian setting including the "zeps" or flying airships, mechanical animals, mechanical humans, and hybrids or part humans and mechanicals were introduced in the first book.  The story then continued with Moonlocket in which Lily and her friends faced off against a new adversary, Jack of Diamonds.  Snippets of Robert's backstory began to emerge and Lily and Robert forged a stronger friendship.  Skycircus is the third book in the Cogheart Adventures series and opens mysteriously with the introduction of a new character,  Angela a young girl imprisoned at the Camden Workhouse.  The story then shifts to Lily, Robert, and Malkin's current predicament in which they're kidnapped by Slimwood and Madame Lyons-Mane.

I was really excited to read Skycircus, imagining a big top filled with magical circus performances.  Everything from clowns, acrobats, the trapeze and walking the tightrope, maybe even Lily and Robert eating some popcorn and cotton candy.  The tag line on the cover also caught my eye, "A Spectacular Showstopper of Trickery and Tightropes."  But I must admit the skycircus has a much creepier atmosphere than I expected.  Not scary but it is a bit unsettling.  The premise begins with the mystery of who sent Lily the message and what exactly they want from her.  Once at the circus, there is the initial excitement of the show, but then the reality of what truly is happening is revealed when the audience has left.  Our two circus owners, Slimwood and Madame Lyons-Mane play their parts as villains very well, they're cruel and unforgiving.  Forcing their animals and circus performers to live in deplorable conditions, always with the threat of harm if they don't toe the line.  They separate the hybrids or part human/mechanicals from the remaining circus performers, thus creating a division between the two to keep them under control.  

As in previous books, I expected there would be an adventure for Lily, Robert, and Malkin.  Yet Skycircus had a much slower pace than its previous books and focused more on conveying the message that differences are just that, differences.   That some can be internal versus the external ones of the hybrid circus performers.  That one should not judge others.  That the choices that we make are important and that we risk being complicit if we don't stand up when we see something wrong.    All important messages that took some time to develop in the storyline.  The addition of new characters also took up much of the story and I was disappointed when Lily and Robert were separated and had to find a way back together.    

Overall, I did enjoy the story and am interested in reading Shadowsea when in releases in the US.  Skycircus can be read as a standalone, but I'd recommend starting with Cogheart.  

Favorite lines from the book:  "No one conquers fear easily.  It takes practice to reach true heights; a brave heart to win great battles."