I’m waiting for Utterly Dark 2 to come back to me for proof-reading, so I’ve been whiling away the time with some Mortal Engines drawings. A typical scene in the Great Hunting Ground Krokodil, an early predator town, built from the repurposed hulls of a fleet of Oster-Rus land ships. Originally wind-powered and devoted to an eco-friendly lifestyle, the city of Thunberg swapped its sails for engines after a few narrow escapes from predator towns, and quickly became one of the most rapacious and heavily polluting cities of the Second Traction Boom. A heavily militarised pirate suburb from the Rustwater Marshes, around the time of the Medusa Event. The slogan on its plates was supposed to read ‘Nom Nom Nom’ but they ran out of space and are currently hunting more townlets so they can increase their surface area. Above and below: small Traktionstadts minding their own business, some time in the middle Traction Era A typical merchant town, heading off to sell its wares at a trading cl...
Reviews and ruminations by Philip Reeve, author of the Mortal Engines series, the Railhead trilogy, Here Lies Arthur, Goblins, and The Legend of Kevin, Pugs of the Frozen North, etc, with Sarah McIntyre.