Castle In the Stars: The Space Race of 1869 by Alex Alice

Seraphin's mother is a scientist who dies trying to prove that aether exists.  Months after her hot air balloon crash, someone finds her flight log and discovers that she did reach the aether level before she died.  That discovery and the belief that the aether can be used to power engines that could take a ship to outer space, fuels a race between enemy nations to be the first to make a aether ship.  Seraphin's father is recruited by the king of Bavaria to design his aether ship, but Seraphin suspects that there is a Prussian spy in the castle trying to steal the plans.

This was a fun graphic novel, drawn in a steam punk, 1800's, style.  It reminded me a little of the novel, Larklight by Philip Reeve.  In both stories the universe is as the people thought it was in the 1800's where the universe is filled with aether, and other planets in our solar system are inhabited.  It is also written like a melodrama, so much so, that the villain even has a long curled mustache like Snidely Whiplash. It is the first in a series, and like the old penny dramas of the 1800's it ends on a cliffhanger.  I think readers of other popular steam punk graphic novels will enjoy this one as well.  The book was originally published in France in 2014, but was translated into English this year.  (60 p. 2014, 2017)