Rowany de Vere and a Fair Degree of Frost by Chaz Brenchley (NewCon Press) | review by Stephen Theaker

Rowany Angelica Marten de Vere was born on Mars, and although the gravity on her version of Mars isn’t as light as in our universe, she would be considered unusually tall on Earth. She spent seven happy years at a Martian boarding school, the Crater School, which looks like a castle and features in the author’s novel Three Twins at the Crater School and its sequels. Now, at the age of twenty-three, she is ready for her first mission as a member of the Colonial Service. The mission is Mr Leontov, a Russian chap who spent time on Venus – now Russia’s new Siberia – and is now looking for safety in the Red Raj. Rowany has to scoot him away before Russian agents close in.

Once they set off, the book is basically one long chase, that involves ice skating over the frozen Martian canals, visiting a frost fair, eating hot chestnuts, dodging bullets, riding in steam trains, and being chased by an airship. Mars is a dangerous world, even now that about half its inhabitants live in cities, but it has bred tough, watchful, self-reliant people full of frontier spirit. Having said that, I didn’t get much of a sense of Mars as a different planet: the story (complete with urchins) could have taken place in Victorian England with very few changes. Nor did it feel as action-packed as the description above might make it sound: it’s quite a long way into the book before there is a confirmed contact with the enemy.

I certainly didn’t dislike it, but it didn't do much for me, and to be fair it probably isn't supposed to! In tone I think it’s aimed at a younger readership, or perhaps an older readership who grew up on Malory Towers or the Chalet School books, and would get a double kick of nostalgia from reading a slightly old-fashioned science fiction adventure featuring the type of heroine typical of those novels. My favourite element was probably the interactions with the local urchins, and the use of whistling to communicate with them, and the rules they followed. They seemed surprisingly forgiving of Rowany's decision to mislead them, putting them in danger for her own benefit, but perhaps that plants a seed for future stories.

This is the second in the publisher’s 2025 NP Novella series, and at the time of writing Kindle Unlimited subscribers can read it for free, the ebook can be bought for £3.99, and paperbacks and signed and limited edition hardbacks can be bought directly from the publisher. ***