Second paragraph of third chapter:

There, a group of five men clustered around a crackling bonfire, next to a poorly built wooden cabin. Behind them stood a high wall built to block people from accidentally falling down the vast drop into the lower levels of the city. The wall had a human-sized hole in it. These were the smugglers I was looking for. Now I only had to find out how fast they would drop me.

Another carefully and richly constructed secondary world, but not interesting enough to carry me past the first fifty pages. You can get it here.

This was my top unread book acquired in 2019 and not by H.G. Wells. Next on that pile is What Might Have Been: The Story of a Social War, by Ernest Bramah.