A great story about the quest for a bombmaker in 1880’s London, one who may have been a fancy watchmaker. And there are a few fancy watchmakers in town, one of whom is from a royal family in Japan and has some odd characteristics. Oh and Gilbert and Sullivan are nearby, and there is a clockwork octopus who steals socks. I’m not 100% sure I understood what was happening during this novel, but I enjoyed trying to figure it out. There’s a lot of great description, a bunch of characters who are flawed but compelling and a few women trying to do what is hard to do in old-time London. Ever so slightly magically realist in a way that I enjoyed.