This audiobook is narrated by an AI Voice. In the giddy dawn of flight – when every reckless dreamer fancied himself a conqueror of the air – one supremely confident amateur straps into his beloved homemade machine, the Alauda Magna, and sets out to astonish the world. What follows is a breathless, white-knuckled account of a maiden flight gone gloriously, terrifyingly wrong: a bolting engine, treacherous winds, and a pilot whose nerve far outstrips his skill. Wells trades cosmic dread for pure farce in this affectionate send-up of the pioneering age of aviation, where the only thing harder than getting up is getting down again in one piece.