Agatha H. and the Airship City

Girl Genius, Book 1

By: Phil Foglio, Kaja Foglio

Narrated by: Angela Dawe

Length: 9 hrs and 15 mins

Publisher's summary

The Industrial Revolution has escalated into all-out warfare. Sixteen years have passed since the Heterodyne Boys, benevolent adventurers and inventors, disappeared under mysterious circumstances. Today, Europe is ruled by the Sparks, dynasties of mad scientists ruling over - and terrorizing - the hapless population with their bizarre inventions and unchecked power, while the downtrodden dream of the Heterodynes’ return.

At Transylvania Polygnostic University, a pretty, young student named Agatha Clay seems to have nothing but bad luck. Incapable of building anything that actually works, but dedicated to her studies, Agatha seems destined for a lackluster career as a minor lab assistant. But when the university is overthrown by the ruthless tyrant Baron Klaus Wulfenbach, Agatha finds herself a prisoner aboard his massive airship Castle Wulfenbach - and it begins to look like she might carry a spark of Mad Science after all.

From Phil and Kaja Foglio, creators of the Hugo, Eagle, and Eisner Award-nominated webcomic Girl Genius, comes Agatha H. and the Airship City, a gaslamp fantasy filled to bursting with Adventure! - Romance! - and Mad Science!

©2011 Phil Foglio (P)2011 Brilliance Audio, Inc.

Great Story

Mad Science! Adventure, Romance, Sword fights, Airships! What else do you need?! Oh Men swinging on cables thousands of feet in the air!

Incredible enjoyable

Phil Foglio has always been a great artist and the story he and his wife create is Wonderful, If you are a follower of girl genius comic then this is a must have. It follows the first three volume of his series but add wonderful details that he would never be able to give in his comics.

If you are a new reader and have discovered his book I recommend you get this and be prepared to enjoy a good listen.

A very good young adult novel

I was expecting it to be a YA story from the title and reviews. It was a very good YA novel, and I wouldn't mind my 15 year old daughter reading this story. It has a positive message about women having success even when you don't get a fair break. I don't think it had any adult language or situations. Overall, if I was younger, this would be awesome, but I'm looking for stuff that is a little bit harder hitting.

Even Better than the Webcomic!!

I truly enjoyed this- I've been a fan of Girl Genius for years, and this did a great job of staying true to the source while filling in subtext not covered in . Also. the performer is delightful!

Steampunk Forever!!!!

What made the experience of listening to Agatha H and the Airship City the most enjoyable?

The 3 Agatha H books that have been recorded are great - pure and simple. Classic comic book styling with solid story telling, great plots, interesting characters and excellent narration. What more do you want? I vill tell you vat you vant - Jagermonsters!!!

Which character – as performed by Angela Dawe – was your favorite?

Heroine definitely but the Jagermonsters are a hoot!

Steampunk adventure that never stops

You have to be a certain type of person to appreciate Agatha H. I won't say what type, but it would help if you liked comic books, and probably be right up your alley if you are into LARP. Anyway, this story has swords, monsters, revivification and talking cats. Enough said.

Don't give up after the first two chapters

Would you recommend this audiobook to a friend? If so, why?

Yes, the lighthearted story is engaging and fun, the dialog is quick and witty, and the 10 hour listen slips by (almost) effortlessly. The "almost" refers to the first couple of chapters, dedicated to introducing many of the major players.

Unfortunately, the main characters are thrown together with several unimportant ones in the beginning, and there's no real hint as to who is important vs. who is not. In the first chapter alone there are at least 9 different characters, each with some background given. While this works fine in a print book (or web comic), where you can easily flip back and brush up on background, it fails miserably in an audio book. Unless you are extremely focused while listening to the first chapter, you will have to go back and listen to it again.

I picked this up as part of a 3 for 2 credits sale based primarily on the listener reviews. I did not realize until I was nearly three-quarters in that it originated as a web comic.

That said, listen to the first chapter, then read through the web comic for "review" rather than listening to the chapter over.

Once you get past the introductory chapter and get a feel for the characters, the book flows almost perfectly.

What did you like best about this story?

The humor and witty banter between the characters. While a totally different style, it reminds me a bit of Josh Whedon's work, especially Firefly/Serenity.

Was there a moment in the book that particularly moved you?

"Moved" may be a bit strong for a comedy/fantasy, but the interaction between Agatha and Gil is really cute and well done.

The start is terrible but 2nd half is great

Any additional comments?

The writers had a tough time transitioning to a novel format (I didn't even know it was a graphic novel --facepalm--) but they really hit their stride in the second half of the book and it became very enjoyable. The performance was great throughout. The first quarter of the book seemed to be all third person narrative of a prologue. It should have been working notes for a prequel novel(s), and it should have been edited way down. The story should have picked up the same place as the graphic novel starts, with background added as needed. The Prologue, i listened to it at 1.5 speed - reserved for stuff i hate. This transitioned to 1.25 speed which is ok for many books. By mid book i slowed it down to normal speed to savor the book. So my excellent rating is for what the book grew into. I recommend you bear with the beginning, with my assurance it get better, both as the world takes shape, but even more so as the excellent writers learn to adapt to this new medium. Sure, some better editing and re-writes would have helped, but there is so much to come i can't fault the authors (too much) for not going back and fixing the beginning. Novelizations of movies and graphic novels can be very difficult, but having the authors master both novel and the graphic novel is quite impressive.

Wonderful story and great voice performance

I'm a big fan of the Foglio's and the Girl Genius comics. Although the audio performance is lacking the wonderful graphics of the books Angela Dawe does a fantastic job giving voice to the different characters. The plot of the story and all the humor and quirky characters are just as I imagined them from the comics.
I pre-screened the audio of the 2 Agatha H novels for an upcoming roadtrip we're taking along with 4 kids age 10-15 and found that while there are a few PG suggestive themes in the book the overall story is fantastic and I think will be well suited for the whole family. We've found that it is amazing how quiet a drive can be, even with 4 children (2 of our own, plus niece and nephew) when you take a good audiobook along. I'm looking forward to many hours of peaceful driving while they all sit back and enjoy these books!

A Fantastical Adventure!

What about Angela Dawe’s performance did you like?

Angela Dawe is an incredibly expressive narrator and breathes life into the the story as she tells it. She's definitely the right voice for the Girl Genius series. all her characters are distinctive and consistent with not only my mental image while listening to the story, but also quite true to the illustrations of each character in the comic series that the book is based on. Also, her dead-pan delivery of the footnotes riddled throughout the book had me grinning like an idiot throughout the listen!

Did you have an extreme reaction to this book? Did it make you laugh or cry?

seeing how I'm an easily influenced fellow, and an engineer to boot, I started "Heterodyning" (rhythmically humming just like good ol' Heterodyne boys did back in the day) while wrenching on helicopters and it became a thing in the shop. now everyone hums catchy tunes and sometimes even harmonius duets while we work. it's slowly driving the boss crazy and that makes me way too happy. I might be a bad person...

Any additional comments?

Girl Genius is a truly imaginative series that follows through with every engineering idea and bizarre whim that occured to the Foglio's to its logically insane conclusion, and that's just the setting. With the sparks, talking cats, Jaeger Monsters, deposed aristrocrats, the looming threat of the Other and it's revenant minions, and the mysterious dissapearance of the Heterodyne Boys, (the seemingly only sane protagonists) This series has dozens of themes, forces and characters all contributing to the melting pot of chaos that is the life of our heroine Agatha. I enjoyed every minute of the story and highly recommend giving it several listens, the little details you inevitably miss make the story more entertaining with each play-through!