Set in a near-future dystopia, Northline combines elements of intrigue, mystery, espionage, political drama, and romance. The year is 2056, and Timothy Loag, a railroad mechanic turned itinerant preacher, is determined to get even with his ex-employer, the Northline Railroad, whose toxic fumes are responsible for the deaths of his father and brother. Guided by the Indian spirits in his dreams, Loag sets out to destroy the megalithic railroad corporation that has an almost unshakeable grip on North American life. The Northline carries nothing but refuse, collected from every corner of the continent, transporting it in remote-controlled, 30-mile-long super-trains. Satellite controlled, the trains race at upwards of a hundred miles an hour to enormous dumpsites in the northern territories—the tundra, the arctic regions of what was originally Canada—which have now become a combination of new states and regional districts merged with the USA. The right-of-way is a toxin-saturated strip of land that no one works or lives near by choice and, if any of the trains had an engineer, he could well be the devil himself.