Plot

Doing my best not to give away anything and yet have concrete detail here. Kind of hard when the entire plot of Atlas Shrugged is a mystery.

The protagonist of the novel is Dagny Taggart, sister of a railroad tycoon Jim Taggart. She however, is the main force behind the railroad, the true person that runs it. She initially sets off to repair a damaged section of track in the railroad, the failing Rio Norte Line.  The railroad’s crisis worsens when the Mexican government nationalizes Taggart’s San Sebastian Line, and her attempts to find able help are stymied by the fact that all the capable entrepreneurs are retiring and disappearing. The San Sebastian had been built to service Francisco d’Anconia’s copper mills, but the mills turn out to be worthless. Francisco had been a successful industrialist, and Dagny’s lover, but has become a worthless playboy. To solve the railroad’s financial problems, Dagny’s brother Jim uses political influence to pass legislation that destroys Taggart’s only competition in Colorado. Dagny must fix the Rio Norte Line immediately and plans to use Rearden Metal, a new alloy created by Hank Rearden. The State Science Institute issues a decree that Rearden Metal is unsound, and Dagny leaves the railroad to form a proxy company. Using this, she attempts to create the John Galt Line to replace the Rio Norte Line, making it entirely from Rearden Metal. Dagny must do all this to save the railroad, all the while trying to figure out "Who is John Galt?"