Book excerpt: British East Africa in the 1880s. A place of mystery, intrigue, and danger. Powerful tribes, many hostile, the descendants of once-great empires, rule the plains and forests. European colonial powers jostle for advantage as they struggle to push inland from their coastal enclaves. A rail line is being driven from Mombasa toward Lake Victoria, drawing laborers and speculators from every civilized continent. The rails have reached Nairobi, a still-tiny boom town where wealthy entrepreneurs rub shoulders with cutthroats and railroad workers, but to reach out further, one must travel by foot or wagon, or by one of the ramshackle airships that connect the scattered settlements. One such ship is Kestrel, once a steam powered river lighter designed to haul cargos up the shallow streams that reach inland from the coast. Rescued from the scrapyard and slung beneath a balloon, she has been given a second chance at life as a carrier in the aerial cargo trade. Business is good in the booming colony, but in every pub and hostel, at the end of every pier, in the alley behind each tavern lurk dangerous men (and women!) of questionable motives, each with his own scheme to claim his share of the colony's wealth, by whatever means come readily to hand. No one completely escapes brushes with these charlatans, and Captain Clinton Monroe's crew is no exception. Join them aboard the Kestrel as they sail the skies to high adventure.