Mr. Barnstaple is a journalist working in London and living in Sydenham. He has grown dispirited at a newspaper called The Liberal and resolves to take a holiday. Quitting wife and family, he finds his plans disrupted when his and two other automobiles are accidentally transported with their passengers into "another world", which the "Earthlings" call Utopia. A sort of advanced Earth, Utopia is some three thousand years ahead of humanity in its development.

Herbert George Wells (1866-1946), known as H. G. Wells, was a prolific English writer in many genres, including the novel, history, politics, and social commentary, and textbooks and rules for war games.