Carla and Jason are two fourteen-year-olds in the year 5009. They live in Paraboloid G Five - a community divided into clearly defined status groups: Elders, Seniors, Inter-eds, Substandards and Unclassifieds. Within this system, Carla and Jason are analogous Inter-eds, but also crucially different. He is a Boff and she is a Nonc.

Life in the Paraboloid is organised and the future predictable until the day Jason finds the Transmutator - a palm-size, flat silver box. He has no idea what it is or where it came from, other than that it fell out of the sky - not much to go on but a discovery that will change everyone's lives and not just on Earth.

Mutania is pure fantasy based on very logical, scientific principles.