Fever Crumb

Reeve, Philip. 2010. Fever Crumb. New York: Scholastic Press. ISBN 9780545207195

Plot Summary

Fever Crumb is the only girl ever to have been accepted into the Order of Engineers who value rationality above all else. Fever is an orphan raised by an engineer, Dr. Crumb, and has never questioned their rejection of all sentimentality. When Fever is sent to assist Kit Solent, an archeologist, with his newest dig, she encounters irrationality that confuses her and old prejudices that soon threaten to kill her. Soon she is running for her life and overwhelmed by dormant memories that challenge all that she thinks she knows about the world, and herself.

Critical Analysis (Including Cultural Markers)

Set about 1000 years in the future, Reeves’ steampunk London resembles Victorian era London where all of the technology we know today has been lost due to some cataclysmic event referred to as the “Downsizing”. The technology that has replaced the old-world technology is strange, beautiful, and sometimes deadly.  The setting and characters provide intriguing glimpses into the London that was, and the London that could be.

Modern day places, deities, and popular culture are referenced throughout the book, corrupted by time and loss of context due to the downsizing. Piccadilly Circus is “Pickled Eel Circus”, Oxford Circus is “Ox-Fart Circus”, and “Hari Potter” is the name of an old-world prophet that is chanted in the streets. The letters “at” have been replaced by the “@” symbol in names, and “blog” is a common swear word. While many of these references to London places and culture may fly over the heads of an American audience (I’m sure there were many that I didn’t recognize), the ones that hit home are sure to elicit chuckles.

Review Excerpts

Kirkus Reviews: “Filled with humor ("blog," as in who gives a, is a swearword) and tackling issues of love, family and power, the author balances the occasional cheap laugh (the Hari Potter cult) or violent death with a finely wrought coming-of-age story starring an unlikely and occasionally unlikable heroine who ... becomes a figure of pathos and dignity.”

Booklist: “London is a nearly medieval backwater, where relics of ancient technology hint at a time thousands of years ago when people still understood how to make circuit boards and microchips.”

Connections

The frequent references to places and names corrupted by time are sure to generate curiosity about their real world equivalents. An interesting activity would be to have readers list the places they recognize from other British books that they have read, see if they can identify other place names that they suspect are corruptions of real place names, and research the significance of these places in British history.

Fever Crumb is a prequel to Philip Reeve’s Hungry City Chronicles: Mortal Engines (HarperTeen, 2003), Predator's Gold (HarperTeen, 2004), Infernal Devices (HarperTeen, 2006), and A Darkling Plain (Scholastic, 2006). Fever Crumb’s adventures continue in A Web of Air (Scholastic, 2010).