1998: The Physiognomy

Welcome to the Well-Built City where Cley is the perfect judge and jury. He is a reliable mediator between life and death because he has been extensively trained in physiognomy – a science (or art?) where every facial feature, body shape and aspect of a personality exposes every secret and can even predict the future. Convinced that he is doing good work, Cley is continually committing atrocities. While his mentor is grooming Cley for greater things, he soon starts to clash with the powerful leaders of his dictatorial society. Cley's quickly realizes that his battles are not only between the attitudes of his colleagues, they are also with himself and the dark, corrupt soul of the city he calls home. Why it's on the list Jeffrey Ford is a master of the evocatively strange and peculiar. This book, together with the two others in the Well-Built City trilogy, has a steampunk feel to them, except steampunk filtered through Faery or Alice's Wonderland. What you seem to think you see may not be there, or may even be something else altogether. The story is fast moving and attention grabbing while at the same time providing intriguing possibilities for future books. The characterizations, settings, and dialogue are excellent. The characters are quite often even more strange than their surroundings. The book is told in a style that is so sparse, yet the story has a strong, mythic feel.