Plot

Set in the near future, in dystopia

Dystopia

A dystopia is the idea of a society in a repressive and controlled state, often under the guise of being utopian, as characterized in books like Brave New World and Nineteen Eighty-Four...

n Melbourne, Australia

Australia

Australia , officially the Commonwealth of Australia, is a country in the Southern Hemisphere comprising the mainland of the Australian continent, the island of Tasmania, and numerous smaller islands in the Indian and Pacific Oceans. It is the world's sixth-largest country by total area...

, The Lost Thing is a story about a boy who enjoys collecting bottle tops

Bottle cap

Bottle caps are a type of closure used to seal the openings of bottles of many types. They can be small circular pieces of metal, usually steel, with plastic backings, and for plastic bottles a plastic cap is used instead. A bottle cap is typically colorfully decorated with the logo of the brand...

 for his bottle top collection. One day, while collecting bottle caps near a beach, he discovers a strange creature, that seems to be a combination of an industrial boiler

Boiler

A boiler is a closed vessel in which water or other fluid is heated. The heated or vaporized fluid exits the boiler for use in various processes or heating applications.-Materials:...

, a crab

Crab

True crabs are decapod crustaceans of the infraorder Brachyura, which typically have a very short projecting "tail" , or where the reduced abdomen is entirely hidden under the thorax...

, and an octopus

Octopus

The octopus is a cephalopod mollusc of the order Octopoda. Octopuses have two eyes and four pairs of arms, and like other cephalopods they are bilaterally symmetric. An octopus has a hard beak, with its mouth at the center point of the arms...

. This creature is referred to as "The Lost Thing" by the narrator.

The boy realizes the creature is lost and out of place. He attempts to find its owner but is not able to, due to the indifference of everyone else. As he is looking for the creature's owner, he is met by a creature who gives him a business card with a weird sign on it. After searching much of the city for the sign, the boy is able to find the sign and follows it to a utopian land for lost things, where he returns the creature,and continues on with his life - although he was unable to say whether the creature really belonged there.

2010 film

This book was adapted into 15-minute animated short film

Animated cartoon

An animated cartoon is a short, hand-drawn film for the cinema, television or computer screen, featuring some kind of story or plot...

 in 2010, directed by Tan and Andrew Ruhemann and narrated by Tim Minchin

Tim Minchin

Timothy David "Tim" Minchin is a British-Australian comedian, actor, and musician.Tim Minchin is best known for his musical comedy, which has featured in six CDs, three DVDs and a number of live comedy shows which he has performed internationally. He has also appeared on television in Australia,...

. It won the Oscar for Best Animated Short. It was nominated for the 2011 Hugo Award for Best Dramatic Presentation, Short Form.

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