What is the next trend -- the next "killer app"? This question is very much on the mind of Ursula Van Urden, a burned-out art student who, after her supermodel sister Ivy's widely publicized suicide attempt, has found work as a trendspotter for Tomorrow, Ltd., in the volcano-shadowed metropolis of Middle City. Armed with only a sketch pad and a mandate to "find the future," Ursula discovers a homeless girl who hunts her own food and lives on the street. This "savage girl" becomes Ursula's first trend and the basis for an advertising scheme that goes madly, disastrously awry.

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