Matt Cruse is a cabin boy on the Aurora, a huge airship that sails hundreds of feet above the ocean, ferrying wealthy passengers from city to city. It is the life Matt's always wanted; convinced he's lighter than air, he imagines himself as buoyant as the hydrium gas that powers his ship. One night he meets a dying balloonist who speaks of beautiful creatures drifting through the skies. It is only after Matt meets the balloonist's granddaughter that he realizes that the man's ravings may, in fact, have been true, and that the creatures are completely real and utterly mysterious. In a swashbuckling adventure reminiscent of Jules Verne and Robert Louis Stevenson, Kenneth Oppel, author of the best-selling Silverwing trilogy, creates an imagined world in which the air is populated by transcontinental voyagers, pirates, and beings never before dreamed of by the humans who sail the skies.

A legendary ghost ship. An incredible treasure. A death-defying adventure. Forty years ago, the airship Hyperion vanished with untold riches in its hold. Now, accompanied by heiress Kate de Vries and a mysterious gypsy, Matt Cruse is determined to recover the ship and its treasures. But 20,000 feet above the Earth's surface, pursued by those who have hunted the Hyperion since its disappearance, and surrounded by deadly high-altitude life forms, Matt and his companions soon find themselves fighting not only for the Hyperion—but for their very lives.

See below for English description. Matt Cruse, futur pilote, est invité à bord du Starclimber en compagnie de la femme qu'il aime, Kate de Vries, experte en faune et flore de haute altitude. Le Starclimber est un vaisseau qui gravit littéralement l'atmosphère jusqu'au cosmos. Matt compte secrètement demander Kate en mariage, mais avant même qu'ils aient embarqué, elle lui annonce ses fiançailles avec un autre. Malgré cette terrible nouvelle et la peine de Matt, ils entament leur voyage dans l'espace. Soudain, le vaisseau est assailli de créatures étranges et dérangeantes, et l'équipe doit faire face à un grave problème mécanique. Pour Matt, Kate, et tous les membres du Starclimber, cette fantastique course aux étoiles s'est transformée en lutte pour leur survie. Pilot-in-training Matt Cruse and his love interest, Kate de Vries, an expert on high-altitude life-forms, are invited aboard the Starclimber, a vessel that literally climbs its way into the cosmos. Matt secretly plans on asking Kate to marry him, but before they even set foot aboard the ship, Kate announces her engagement—to someone else. Despite this bombshell, and Matt's anguish, they embark on their journey into space, but soon the ship is surrounded by strange and unsettling life-forms, and the crew is forced to combat devastating mechanical failure. For Matt, Kate, and the entire crew of the Starclimber, what began as an exciting race to the stars has now turned into a battle to save their lives. Original Starclimber