https://www.goodreads.com/review/show/6241294931

A 3.5 for me, which I've rounded up. Brilliant concept, well written, agree with all the other reviewers that if you enjoy things like the Night Circus and Piranasi, you'll like this one. There was just something slightly off with the pacing for me - the middle section started to sag a little - and I also wasn't 100 percent sold on the ending. Also not sure if there were meant to be deeper themes at work - are the Wastelands a metaphor for something? Or whether everything is just meant to be taken at its fun, slightly magical face value. All in all for me an interesting, original book, that comes close to being great but just slightly misses the mark. Thanks to the author, publisher and NetGalley for the ARC.

Before you even start it, you can tell that The Cautious Traveller's Guide to the Wastelands is going to take you to strange places. The title alone is promising enough, but the basic outline premise is even more intriguing. It involves a long train journey from Beijing to Moscow in 1899, the service provided by the the Trans-Siberia Company. It's back up and running again, reportedly stronger than ever after the mysterious circumstances of the last journey across the stricken Wastelands that caused the crew and passengers to lose their memory of the journey. As you are introduced to the passengers however, you soon begin however to wonder where the real danger is; whether it will come from the blight that has made the land outside uninhabitable and still carries strange sickness or whether it will come from the odd assembly of passengers on board, each taking the journey for private reasons, some clearly for different reasons than those they make public to the others.

There is every good reason to be cautious then and heed the advice of Valentin Rostov, the author of what is to date the definitive guidebook (as definitive as any can be) for those undertaking a journey unlike any other. It's a 15 day journey during which the train will pass through the second great wall of China - this one built to keep out the danger of the Wastelands - and cross what remains of Greater Siberia, at the end of which they will not pass the Vigil at the Russian side until there is an assurance that nothing of the Wastelands comes in with them. Anyone could be affected by the strange visions many are subjected to on the journey, particularly those already not of a sure frame of mind. There are definitely a few potential candidates fitting that description among the passengers on this trip.

There is Marya Petrovna, a widow who claims she is returning home to St Petersburg after the death of her husband and parents, but in reality she holds a deep grudge against the Trans-Siberia Company, blaming them for the death of her father. There is Dr Henry Grey, a disgraced naturalist whose theories have been discredited and found to be false, who is hoping to regain his reputation at the Great Exhibition in Moscow by unravelling some of the secrets of the Wastelands. You have to have an obligatory Countess on board and a cleric to denounce the godless land they travel through. Two Company men, Li Huangjin and Leonid Petrov, known as the Crows, are there as representatives of the Trans-Siberia company, suspicious of anyone who might seek to undermine the power or reputation of the Company, such as those publications made by a writer known as Artemis.

There is also Zhang Weiwei, who was born on the train to one of the serving maids. She is 16 now, but this is the only world she has ever known and she has become part of the features, able to make her way around all its secret corners and passages. There have also been sightings of a ghost on board the train, or perhaps it's just a stowaway. On this train the however difference could be hard to tell.

So to consider my question about whether the danger comes more from the inside than the outside ...well that depends on your viewpoint, as one could be said to affect the other. What is outside however is definitely strange and dangerous and it's brilliantly described by Sarah Brooks. In some parts it reminded me of Brian Catling's The Vorrh trilogy and in others of J.G. Ballard (like the Crystal World in a period setting), but Brooks creates her own original vision of the disturbing and unnatural, haunting and hallucinatory Greater Siberian Wastelands, capable of deceiving the eyes and deranging the mind. The author's distinct quality is in this alternate-world period setting, the marvellous characters she depicts aboard the train and how they react to the unfolding events. Those events develop slowly, but build into something dark and dangerous. This is quite a journey, but approach with caution.

After watching Snowpiercer I was very excited for this book. But unlike the TV show I could not get into the book. I simply didn't understand the significance of the train.

I enjoyed this book. It is set in a time period I like to read about, the late nineteenth century and also it's about a journey on the Trans Siberian Express train. This is a book you can get lost in and will want read it until the end. It was unsettling at times but that adds to the enjoyment.
The passengers of the train get wind of problems about the train and the journey. The book is engrossing and there is so much about it that makes it full of beauty and mystery. The journey the passengers take is unnerving and the book takes you across the wild wastelands to Moscow..
I can't wait to read more from this author.

I went into this book with the expectation of a train journey through a mysterious wasteland. I went in hoping for something along the lines of Orient Express meets monsters. What I got was a cautiously slow book filled with bland characters and lacking in plot.

So much felt unexplained even when I finished the book, which I struggled to do, I still felt adrift.

I wouldn't grab this book, but if you do maybe its a bedside table read.

4.5 stars rounded up.
Thank you to NetGalley and Orion for the ARC.

Wow, this was a pigeonhole-defying, thought-provoking rollercoaster of a read. If you enjoyed Piranesi or the Night Circus then you will probably enjoy this too as it has a similar dream-like quality to it.
The novel is set in an alternative Nineteenth Century, where an expanse of land between China and Russia has started to transform and evolve and so this ‘Wasteland’ has been shut off from the rest of civilisation by fortifications and barriers. The story follows the journey of an impenetrable train, the Trans-Siberian express, as it travels across the Wastelands and interweaves the stories of the passengers with the growth and encroachment of the environment outside of the train.
Brooks’ writing is superb. They managed to keep me gripped throughout the story with excellent character development and an ability to evoke and evolve the dreamlike and almost psychedelic influences of the new world that she has built. The multiple POVs of the book worked really well and helped to keep the narrative moving along without losing the sense of rising claustrophobia associated with so many people inhabiting a small space over an extended period of time. Loved this!

This was a beautifully written book that blurred the lines between what's real and what isn't, the industrial world and the natural world. Brooks weaves a rich tapestry of characters and sweeping landscapes, and each traveller entices the reader with their own story unfolding differently along the endless tracks.

This made me think of The Fall of the House of Usher and Murder on the Orient Express, with lots of social commentary and touching moments.

An incredible literary fantasy, exquisitely written and impeccably plotted. Echoes of Snowpiercer and Fallout, but wrapped with intricately woven lives and hearts and connection. The land and the train and the people, all connected, all striving - this is a breathtaking glimpse of a vivid new world.

A steampunk style fantasy set on a train in an alternate Victorian era? Count me in! ....Or so I thought. It pains me that I ditched this almost halfway as I just couldn't for the life of me get into it. I don't know if it was perhaps the story, which I found a bit boring, or maybe the fact that it was just. so. slowww.

It opens up with the train setting off on its first journey in some time after the events of something devastating that occurred on the last voyage had kept it from running. However there's a lot of mystery over what happened and they dance around the subject a lot. Nevertheless, it sounded compelling and I was initally intrigued enough to try and find out what may happen... except I just found my mind constantly drifting whenever I read and losing concentration. idk if it was maybe because I felt the story just seemed to drag and I kept waiting expecting something exciting to occur, or whether I just couldn't connect with the writing or characters for whatever reason. Apart from Weiwei I found myself not really caring about any of the others, which may partially be a reason I struggled. Usually I have to get attached to or intrigued by the characters to some degree in order to feel fully invested in a story. I also feel like there were elements of magical realism and horror involved which tends to be an aspect of a book I avoid simply because I don't really enjoy it.. and I think I somehow overlooked that before requesting it.

I had high hopes initially because the blurb had me sold so I'm a bit gutted it didn't hit for me like it had for many others.

That's definitely not to say that others won't enjoy this, I think it just didn't tick all the right boxes for me this time.

Disclaimer: This e-ARC was sent to me by Netgalley in exchange for an honest review.

Steampunk railroad based fantasy, with a female lead. Fast paced, though mainly barrelling through the indescribable Wastelands full of natural mutations, reminiscent of Tepper or Vandermeer. Enjoyable face off between the Empire and the Unknown.

The Cautious Travellers guide to the Wastelands is set on board the Trans-Siberian train run by The Company. The train travels between Beijing and Moscow.

The Wastelands is a strange and mysterious place that is feared by passengers and staff alike.

I enjoyed the first third or so of this book but just felt like it dragged on after that. The book is well written and the characters are well developed however in my opinion the book could have been around 100 pages shorter and still would have told the complete story.

I would read other books by Sarah Brooks. This one just wasn't for me.

Loved this! Magical, beautiful, and utterly absorbing. Truly delightful writing, with a constant sense of suspense throughout. The visuals described in this book have really stuck with me, and I loved each one of the characters and what they brought to the story.

I thought this was a great title and it lived up to its promise of fantasy and quirkiness, with a good dose of steam-punk, all things I love. I felt it became a bit rambling towards the end, but I did really enjoy the mix of intrigue, politics and world-building. I think it would make a great film.

An incredible new voice in the genre. The trans-Siberia express takes a journey through the wastelands, a toxic land between Beijing and Moscow, where the mutated land is filled with horrors. We join Wei Wei, the child of the train, Marya a woman wanting to learn the secrets of a previous journey with secrets of her own, and Henry Grey who is out to restore his reputation. It is a compelling narrative of the greed of capitalism and the restoration of nature.

The atmosphere of this book is intoxicating, as though you are too are one with the train traversing the impenetrable Wastelands. The world-building was incredible and left me wanting more, there are so many secrets left uncovered and if I could join the journey I would.

The mystery weaved throughout kept me from putting it down and I couldn’t stop thinking about it. And I think Brooks toed the line between telling us too much and keeping the mystery alive well. But I still want more!

At times you feel the claustrophobia and fear within the train and at others the mesmerising pull of the wastelands wanting to go further and deeper into it to find out more. Brooks has created a wonderful read I’d recommend to fans of the genre!

What a brilliant adventure, there are elements of horror and sci-fi but it is the mystery of what lies within the wastelands that pulls the reader in. Climb aboard and strap yourself in for a wondrous journey, one filled with strange creatures and a hearty dose of danger, humans full of their own concerns and those with secrets and plans. The last journey was hailed a disaster but this one will be life changing; for the girl of the train, who was born and raised on it, the Professor who has surveyed the land on many crossings and for Marya, desperate to reverse the damage to her fathers reputation.
I loved the interplay between the characters, amongst the passengers and the crew. They had depth and interest and you could easily imagine their lives before this journey. The threads was an interesting idea and I liked how this was used to transform the landscape and beyond. The epilogue was intriguing, I am desperate to read what’s next! This is a great story, utter escapism and one that it's hard to put down or stop thinking about.

Trains and Maps, two things I’ve loved forever, maps more than trains, but still.

What we have here is an enigma wrapped in a mystery, it starts simple enough, and takes the times to introduce characters in great detail, and many there are. Marya Petrovna, a widow travelling to a destination as yet unknown. WeiWei, the child of the train, born there as her mother died, her father gone as well, all she has ever known is the train. Dr Henry Grey, the best of what the English are, and in that moment, the worst, but these are not the only characters. There’s a rich diversity of characters there, each with their own motivations and drives, for those are not always the same, and there are many to bring forwards until the story begins.

On the surface of it, it’s a trip between Beijing and Moscow, upon the Trans Siberian Express, but it soon becomes apparent that something else has happened here. The landscape upon which they travel is different, somehow altered, at once familiar and yet twisted, whether in a wholesome way or not is not clear.

I believe that there is no such thing as too much worldbuilding, but there is always the temptation to show how well the world has been built, to feature all the aspects of it even though the story does not warrant explaining them. Brooks does not make that mistake, leaving enough of a mystery that it becomes something you want to keep on reading, even when things turn strange.

And they do turn strange.

The wastelands through which the train travels carry some sort of infection, thought to be something in the air, but as the train is brought to a stop, it’s found that there are creatures out there, and beyond the creatures, something else. A stowaway on the train, not human, but not inhuman, not seeking to harm anyone but not acting in ways that everyone can see are without harm.

This is superbly dense storytelling, every chapter advances the storyline in one way or another, every part of it moves something along, even if it’s not in a direction you were expecting. The changes that start occurring from the middle of the book (persevere, it’s worth it), are both unsettling and intriguing, and the lightness of touch with which those things are illuminated is spectacular.

Overall this was a superb book, would recommend it to anyone who favours strong storytelling with a rich cast of well thought through characters and endings that could not have even vaguely been considered at the commencement of the story.

I will not be reviewing this book publicly as it did not really connect with me. Rather than give it a negative review - it was well written but just didn't connect - I will leave it to others to review.

Cautious Traveller’s Guide to the Wastelands really impressed me with it’s clever writing and intriguing worldbuilding, while mixing together elements of Sci-Fi, Horror and Historical Fiction.

In the world Sarah Brooks has created here, the ‘wastelands’ of Siberia have become infested with some incomprehensible and madness-inducing horror, resulting in the bordering nations erecting monstrous walls on their borders to try and contain the threat, whatever that may be. The travel routes that avoid the wastelands are long and laborious, so the ‘Company’ has constructed a railroad and armoured train that runs right through the centre, slashing travel times for those who can afford to travel. There’s a really intense feeling of suspense that the novel builds, as the train rolls out from behind the safety of the Beijing walls. Even more so when it quickly becomes apparent that this will be no ordinary voyage, even by the company’s standards. There are almost certainly elements of horror to the story too, that fans of Mexican Gothic and Poe’s Fall of the House of Usher would love. It’s the kind of book to question whether what you're seeing is real or a hallucination and sign of early onset madness.

Right from the offset, the scene setting is very clever and well-crafted through the use of subtle exposition – we establish for example that one of our lead characters is from St Petersburg, and does not consider themselves ‘of sound mind’, all without being expressly told these facts. Several other sneaky bits of exposition are delivered through snippets of a guidebook to the wastelands owned by several of the characters, and which gives the novel it’s title. The disgraced naturalist Henry Grey was probably my favourite character in the book (though I am a sucker for a morally ambiguous narrator!), and I love how his attitude to the perils of the journey are often in stark contrast to his fellow travellers.

The imagery throughout the novel really is top tier, from the vast and imposing walls of Beijing and Moscow, to the train itself, which is described interestingly as a feat of architecture rather than engineering. The nationalities and aesthetics of the train are a fascinating blend of Russian and Chinese customs. I really like this idea and imagery, and I’m really pleased that the main POV characters of the novel represent both nations, though I would have loved the book to have pushed these themes and the differences between these two nations even more.

An extraordinarily imagination historical fantasy that takes place on a journey on the Trans-Siberian Railway. The story is told from the viewpoint of three characters: Weiwei is an orphan, born and raised on the train, Marya is a passenger looking for answers surrounding the mystery of the previous train train and Henry Grey is a disgraced naturalist looking for redemption. The train travels from Beijing to Moscow and passes through a vast wild area called the Wastelands. As the journey progresses the boundary between the natural wildness of the outside and the controlled environment within the train starts to blur.
I spent a lot of time whilst reading this story trying to work out if there was any symbolism, hidden metaphors or deep meaning in all the quirkiness. In the end, I gave up trying and just enjoyed the story in all its strangeness. It is essentially a battle between nature (the Wastelands) and capitalist control and power (the train company).
The writing is beautiful and the pace is gentle but compelling. I loved the characters, especially Weiwei.
This is not an action packed mystery but it is an amazing, imaginative story full of wonders. A lovely read.

This book is fantastical in the true sense of the work. The trans-siberean express runs through the wasteland, where strange plants grow and surreal creatures roam. The very air is tainted. The train is a steam powered fortress that powers through the landscape, fortified so that it never comes into contact with the outside.
The TransSiberia company is a powerful entity and an oppressive presence throughout the novel. The book has three points of view - Weiwei, the child of the train, who knows the train better than anyone; Marya, who is in disguise and trying to find the truth and Henry Grey, who is desperate to get out into the wasteland and collect samples.
The writing shows the atmosphere on the train - partly exciting, partly claustrophobic, vividly. It's set in a sort of alternative history and, although I don't think the time period is specified, it feels like the golden age of steam.
The story goes along at a good pace and I genuinely wasn't sure what was going to happen at the end.
I really enjoyed this book. It's vibrant, imaginative and interesting.
I got a review copy from Netgalley. I requested it mainly because it was set on a steam train (and I'm a sucker for a steam train!).