The book comes in the following structure: Preface Ada Lovelace: The Secret Origin! The Pocket Universe [A series of 8 stories set in said alternate Pocket Universe] Appendix 1: Some Amusing Primary Documents Appendix 2: The Analytical Engine
Epilogue
Each chapter, each story has a good number of footnotes running alongside it, plus extensive endnotes expanding on both the footnotes and the story and its characters in general. My, the research which went into this, and which got digested to be brought to us in easily absorbable and entertaining morsels!
The chapters are also chock full of anecdotes, in-jokes, and historical (and current) references, both illuminating of the story and/or entertaining to the reader. These paint a vivid picture of the protagonists and their world, on multiple levels (and that’s despite most of the events in the cartoon being fictitious!)
I’m not sure how much more to tell you without spoiling your fun of reading this yourself? All the cartoons are in black and white, and mostly in a variety of fairly classical page layouts (there are some exceptions when some of the stories get rather esoteric and imaginary, in a mathematical meaning of course.
Who should read this? Anybody loving intelligent and clever comics. Anybody interested in the history of computing. And everybody with an interest in the history, society, and the historical figures of the 19th century. And do I really need to mention Steampunk fans? Thought so…
More Sydney Padua
Title: The Thrilling Adventures of Lovelace and Babbage Author: Sydney Padua Reviewer: Markus
Reviewer URL: http://thierstein.net
Publisher: Particular Books
Publisher URL: http://www.penguin.com
Publication Date: 2015 Review Date: 170716 ISBN:9780141981512 Price: USD 16.99 Pages: 315 Format: Hardback Topic: Alternate History
Topic: Computing
Markus Thierstein is a former professional skater and editor for Diversebooks. These days he pretends to work for a living, and only do sport for fun. He blogs, mainly in review form, on thierstein.net.
