Dodging disaster - on the edge of radical invention James Swift, Jr., son of the great inventor Sir James Swift, has developed a revolutionary airship design. He and his friend Charles Newton attempt to prove the airship's superiority, engaging in a hair-raising air race to Paris.

However, old enemies of the Swift family have stolen key plans and are bent on sabotage. Others want the Swift airship to fail... and for their own reasons fail dramatically. Is something even more sinister at work, as James' sister Sandra believes? What calamity threatens Charles' budding romantic interest in Sandra, Or Lady Swift's exploding batteries and electric car, the Phalanx.

James Swift and his Airship Laboratory is among the first steampunk novels to use correct period technology, generously illustrated with more than thirty illustrations and photographs. The James Swift series of books are the first which allow the reader to print out the book's lavish illustrations and to use a 3-D printer to print out the Steampunk illustrated inventions. This book may not be suitable for younger readers due to violence and adult themes.