Despite her father being a prominent captain of industry in her hometown of Providence, Sophronia Tempest struggles to be taken seriously in her chosen career as a journalist. It is when she and her boyfriend, the eminently suitable Arthur Botwink, attend a meeting of a supposed sect, the Starry Sodality, and hear an address by Isadora Blank, self-declared 'Hierophant and Opener of the Way', that things start to spiral out of control.

Before she knows it, Sophronia, Arthur, and the irascible Reuben Standeven - a fellow journalist, who keeps getting the assignments she deserves - are caught up in far-reaching events beyond their imagining. Following their instincts, they find themselves in another world and are party to a fiendish scheme that seems set to come to a head on the day of the big parade to celebrate 250 years since the founding of Providence. Unless, that is, they can stop it.

But how is Sophronia's mentor, the celebrated academic Professor Aurion Charnley, involved?

And where do all the cats keep disappearing to?