Set more than a thousand years in the future following a cataclysmic conflict known as the Sixty Minute War, the remnants of mankind regroup and form mobile cities, called "Traction Cities". Under a philosophy known as "Municipal Darwinism", larger "predator" cities hunt and absorb smaller settlements in the "Great Hunting Ground", which includes
Great Britain and
Continental Europe. In opposition, settlements of the "Anti-Traction League" have developed an alternative civilization consisting of "static settlements" (traditional, non-mobile cities) in
Asia led by Shan Guo (formerly
China), protected by the "Shield Wall". Relics of 21st-century technology such as toasters, computers, and
smartphones are valued by
historians as "Old-Tech". The city of
London captures a small Bavarian mining town called Salzhaken, absorbing its population and resources, under orders of
Lord Mayor Magnus Crome. Tom Natsworthy, an apprentice historian, arrives at London's "Gut" to collect Salzhaken's Old-Tech for London's Museum. Hester Shaw, a masked twenty-something woman among the Salzhakens, attempts to
assassinate Thaddeus Valentine, Head of the Guild of Historians, but Tom intervenes, pursuing Hester to a chute. Hester escapes, but not before telling Tom that Valentine murdered Hester's mother and scarred Hester's face. When Tom informs Valentine of this, Valentine pushes Tom down the chute. Tom and Hester are forced to work together to traverse the Hunting Ground, surviving Southies, Scavs on a night hunt, and finding refuge in a vehicle called Scuttlebug, but the owners lock Hester and Tom in a cell, intending to sell Hester and Tom as slaves. Hester confides that Valentine killed her archaeologist mother Pandora after stealing a piece of Old-Tech that Pandora found in a dig in the Dead Continent of the
Americas, while young Hester escaped with a necklace her mother gave her. Meanwhile, Valentine frees Shrike, a reanimated
cyborg known as a "Stalker", from the offshore walking prison Sharkmoor by destroying the prison, to find and kill Hester. At the slave market of Rustwater in the Outlands, Tom and Hester are rescued by Anti-Traction League agent Anna Fang. During the fight, Hester is pursued by Shrike. Hester explains that Shrike had found and raised Hester after escaping Valentine, and Hester promised to let Shrike turn Hester into a Stalker like Shrike, but Hester left after discovering that London had entered the Great Hunting Ground, giving Hester a chance to kill Valentine. In London, Valentine's good-natured daughter Katherine grows estranged from Valentine, especially after Apprentice Engineer Bevis Pod informs Katherine that Valentine pushed Tom down the chute, and Bevis and Katherine learn Valentine's energy project in the re-purposed
St Paul's Cathedral is more than it seems. Hester and Tom travel on Anna's airship, the
Jenny Haniver, to the airborne city Airhaven, meeting other Anti-Traction League members. After questioning Hester, Tom realizes Pandora discovered a computer core for MEDUSA, a
quantum energy-based superweapon used by the belligerents during the Sixty Minute War to instantly destroy entire cities, albeit shattering the Earth's crust into a thousand pieces that have rearranged the former continents. The Guild of Engineers has stolen the remaining components from Tom's museum workshop and built a MEDUSA under Valentine's orders. Shrike catches up with Hester, resulting in a fierce skirmish that critically wounds Shrike and destroys Airhaven. Realizing that Hester is in love with Tom, Shrike spares Tom and frees Hester of her promise before perishing. As Hester, Tom, and Anna travel to the Shield Wall of Batmunkh Gompa with the surviving Anti-Tractionists, Valentine kills Crome in a coup and musters support from Londoners by vowing to destroy the Shield Wall with MEDUSA and lead London to a new Hunting Ground in Asia. Anna convinces Shan Guo's Governor Kwan to launch the Anti-Tractionist airship fleet against London, but MEDUSA destroys the fleet and starts blasting a hole through the Shield Wall. After coming upon a stone carving of
Medusa, Hester discovers that Pandora's necklace hides a "
crash drive", a
kill switch for MEDUSA. Hester, Tom, Anna, and the remaining Anti-Tractionists lead a raid against London, braving the city's anti-aircraft guns. Hester and Anna infiltrate St Paul's, and though Valentine mortally wounds Anna during a sword duel, Hester destroys MEDUSA with the crash drive. In a last-ditch attempt to destroy the Shield Wall, the insane Valentine has his henchmen kill the city's control crew and put the city on full throttle on a collision course with the Wall with no concern for all involved. With Katherine's help, Tom uses the
Jenny Haniver to destroy London's engine. Hester catches and fights Valentine aboard Valentine's airship, where Valentine reveals that Valentine is Hester's father. Tom rescues Hester and shoots down Valentine's ship, which is crushed by London's slowing tracks, killing Valentine. With Valentine dead, the surviving Londoners, now led by Katherine, make peace with the Anti-Tractionists of Shan Guo. As Governor Kwan welcomes the Londoners, Tom and Hester embrace each other and leave in the
Jenny Haniver together to see the world. ==Cast==