There is an alternate cover edition for this edition here. Sixteen-year-old Charlotte and her fellow refugees have scraped out an existence on the edge of Britain’s industrial empire. Though they live by the skin of their teeth they have their health (at least when they can find enough food and avoid the Imperial Labor Gatherers) and each other. When a new exile with no memory of his escape from the coastal cities or even his own name seeks shelter in their camp he brings new dangers with him and secrets about the terrible future that awaits all those who have struggled has to live free of the bonds of the empire’s Machineworks. The Inventor’s Secret is the first book of a YA steampunk series set in an alternate nineteenth-century North America where the Revolutionary War never took place and the British Empire has expanded into a global juggernaut propelled by marvelous and horrible machinery.

Charlotte may have left the Floating City, but she’s not out of danger yet. On the run from the British Empire’s clutches, she leads her group of exiles west and south, plunging into a wild world of shady merchants and surly rivermen on the way to New Orleans. But the more Charlotte learns about the revolution she has championed, the more questions she has. As she and her friends get to know the hidden tunnels that run below New Orleans, home to criminals, assassins, and pirates, and head deep into the mystical bayou surrounding the city, Charlotte must make a decision. Do the revolution’s goals justify their means, or are some things too sacred to sacrifice?

Charlotte is on the run. The Empire is hunting her. The Revolution wants her back. And Charlotte has allied herself with pirates, just to stay safe. But things are not what they seem. There’s a traitor in the revolutionaries’ midst pulling unseen strings, and surprises lurk around every corner. As Charlotte is left to sort out what she truly thinks about the revolution she’s spent her whole life fighting for, she must also battle to keep herself and her friends alive.