From one of Italy's most brilliant and most inventive writers comes the story of two visionaries of the mid-nineteenth century. Mr Rail is a small-town entrepreneur and glass-maker, and Hector Horeau is the Parisian architect who commissions him to make the glass for the Crystal Palace. They are joined by the extravagant inventor, Pekisch, and Elisabeth, a steam locomotive racing along on a railway to nowhere. Theirs is a Kafkaesque tale of angry visions, confused emotions and fantastic ambitions.