"FINISHING SCHOOL" SERIES, by Gail Carriger

The stories: ETIQUETTE & ESPIONAGE--Sophronia Temminnick is a tomboy, skulker, and troublemaker. Her family, back-country aristocrats in a very steampunk 1800s England, aspire to gentility, but Sophronia does NOT fit the mold--so when Sophronia is recruited to attend Miss Geraldine's Finishing Academy for Young Ladies of Quality, the family is relieved. Little do they know that when she arrives, she'll be consorting with vampires and werewolves--not to mention boys of a lower social order! There's an equal amount of knife fighting and vampire defense as there is practicing dancing and flirting. They're being finished, all right--but for what? Sophronia concludes they'll either end up as intelligencers or assassins--and right now, she's going to use her developing skills to find out what the "prototype" is that everyone's trying to steal from each other. Maybe she'll even steal it for herself! CURTSIES & CONSPIRACIES--The mystery surrounding the "prototype" begins to be cleared up as Miss Geraldine's Academy makes a trip to London to witness its test run. Will it really enable dirigibles to travel the aetherstream at incredible speeds? Will Dimity really end up with Lord Dingleproops as her boyfriend? And will Sophronia choose Soap, or Lord Felix, as her flame-du-jour? All shall be revealed, plus a little more, in Book 2!