American illustrator Michael Koelsch painted the cover art of Baker's first three novels in The Company series, including Mendoza in Hollywood.
What we are reading is apparently her confession of why she deserted her post and ran away with a mortal, and then violently killed the six others responsible for his death.
For over 150 years she has lived wild in the Pacific coast forest, collecting and cataloging plant species, and rarely interacting with anybody else, human or cyborg.
Mendoza's first night is a rough one, as she dreams incessantly of Nicholas Harpole, her lover in 16th century England, who was burned at the stake.
She is woken by Porfirio, who tells her she has been blasting the place with "Crome radiation", the blue radiance of psychic activity.
In one chapter, we get a long and reverent description of them watching D.W. Griffith's Intolerance, with Einar as Chorus describing every scene.
Despite precautions and a lot of very futuristic equipment, Mendoza and Einar suddenly find themselves thrown forward in time to 1996.
Mendoza the botanist is suddenly in urban LA, where the soil is concrete and the major life form is the automobile.
Staggering up to a Company safe house whose future location they know, they are hastily taken inside by the staff, who have been expecting this event.
They seem to relate to a British plot to exploit the disarray in the United States and take over the Channel Islands, specifically Santa Catalina.
All the others are called away also, except for Mendoza and Juan Bautista, who has finally allowed his pets to be shipped out with all the other biological samples.
At this point, Mendoza is astonished by the arrival of her ex-lover, Nicholas Harpole, except that he does not recognize her and goes by the name of Edward Alton Bell-Fairfax, an Englishman with mysterious intentions.
However he is also intrigued by Mendoza, who shows sexual sophistication despite being virgo intacta - apparently the healing capability of the cyborg physiology has gone to extremes in her.
Once more Mendoza embarks on an idyll, as they trek to San Pedro, and then to Santa Catalina, where a mysterious sailing ship awaits.
In the meantime, she examines her considerable store of information about the history of old LA, noticing for the first time how Santa Catalina has some kind of significance in the activities of the company.
Her job is to raise food for a Company resort on Santa Cruz Island, where rich folks come back to hobnob with mastodons and hunt saber-tooths, or maybe vice versa.
The action takes place in Cahuenga Pass, by modern Hollywood, old Los Angeles, San Pedro, and the island of Santa Catalina.
When thrown forward in time, Mendoza and Einar, along with their horses, find themselves alongside a busy 20th century highway.