Book recommendation: The Dead Isle

[Sofaspud]

I stumbled across this by way of some fanart someone had drawn that turned up in a Google image search on a totally unrelated topic, and have just surfaced for air a day or so later, having ignored most bodily functions and other such inconsequentialities to read this thing.
The blurb:

Jack Baker is an engineer in a world where magic is an everyday
occurrence. Clare Fields is an expatriate from a country that has no
contact with the outside world. Ellis Graveworthy is a famous novelist
and a spy. Purva de la Fitte is a pirate princess with a sensible soul.
Join them in a steampunk adventure spanning three continents in search
of the answer to the puzzle of Australia -- The Dead Isle.

Link (yes, it's on LJ): http://community.livejournal.com/theori ... 24703.html

--sofaspud
--"Listening to your kid is the audio equivalent of a Salvador Dali painting, Spud." --OpMegs