It is the late 1800s and Devin MacArthur is growing to adulthood in the shadow of his inventor genius father. The great Cyrus MacArthur invented the Geoscope and is said to be the closest to finding a cure to the dreaded clanking consumption. This is a world powered by coal and steam, but coal has a dark side. Well, obviously coal has a dark side, but it has another one. Those who breathe in the ever present coal smog often begin to grow little mechanical insects and plants within their lungs. These mechanisms clank and they tick as they grow, and they slowly consume those that they grow within. England, that island floating in the skies over the eastern Atlantic Ocean, is the most powerful nation in the world and calls no nation her enemy. British naval ships use steam to sail upon the surface of the world's oceans keeping water ways shrouded in mist safe for British trading vessels. Her airships use sails to ply their ways from cloud bank to cloud bank. None would dare to Britannia an enemy, but if Britannia has no enemies who can she call an ally? Something sinister lurks within the seas upon which Queen Victoria's navy sails. The identity of this enemy is no mystery however. Naturalistic scientists and historians have long known of reclusive Atlantis. How could they not know when even airships need to touch water in order to let their Geoscopes listen to the ticking of the gears within the earth? Atlantis was bad enough, but now something else stalks within the mist filled skies over the Atlantic Ocean like a tiger looking to prey upon any ship found alone. The airships of Queen Victoria's navy are supposed to be the best in the world, and yet even some of them have vanished into the mists never to be heard from again. This is the ocean and this is the navy to which Devin MacArthur finds himself fighting to survive. He must literally learn the ropes when serving aboard one of Her Majesty's Battleships of the Line. Falling to one's death from the rigging or drowning are dangerous, but he quickly learns that the most dangerous thing that one can encounter aboard ship walks upon two legs. Aboard ship Devin meets Savannah Davis, a young American girl whose parents operate the ship's aetheroscope. The two then meet Feliciatas Bernath, who is forced into the role of diplomat when danger threatens the Austria-Hungarian Empire. Devin catches the eye of Savannah, but wonders if she is simply after his father's inventions. He also catches the eye of the lady Feliciatas, but what can an inventor's son offer to a foreign aristocrat. In his time plying this sea of gears and steam Devin will experience pain and joy, love and loss. He will bounce back from a personal disaster, but as more or less than he was before?
About the Author: Dan Jager spent half of his youth in and around Washington DC where he learned that reality could be stranger than fiction. He spent the other half of his youth in Iowa where he taught himself to write by writing novels. From his hidden lair in Southern Wisconsin, Dan Jager plots the destruction of several entire worlds and then foils these same plots, all whilst enjoying fine cheeses and some of the best beer in the world. To do this he has studied history, science, and art. To stay sane Dan continues to write. As a writer his motto is: "When the world is coming to an end, what better option is there than to create an entirely new world to live in."