from the introduction: The Eternal City is a world at ninety degrees to our own. It is a world where alchemy works and where the human animus (the spirit of life) can be captured and maintained indefinitely and then put to work in any one of thousands of useful mechanical inventions. It is a world that lives in the dark shadow of unshakeable moral certitudes that maintain an unfair and oppressive system of class and social division. It is also a world of progress and ambition, greed and heroism, sinister conspiracies and astounding selflessness. Where a few good people can peel back the darkness, even if only briefly.