Tolstoia, a colony on Venus, is populated by followers of the 19th century Russian novelist, Count Leo Tolstoi. They have developed their own curious political system that deems itself a pacifist Utopia. Curiously, however, any inhabitants who try to leave end up committing suicide. Our small band of heros and heroines have been despatched to Tolstoia to determine whether they should be given the permission of the Intercolonial Office to colonize a nearby group of uninhabited islands. Their mission is to determine whether Tolstoia really is Utopia or merely a Potemkin Village, created to fool the rest of humankind. - Summary by Winnifred Assmann