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FiftyTwo comments on Open Thread, April 15-30, 2013 - Less Wrong
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Genuine question: What do you find appealing about it? I've always found the writing impenetrable and the philosophy unappealing.
The writing, I agree, is pretty bad, and she has an odd obsession with trains and motors. I can just about understand the "motor" part because it allows some not very good "motor of the world" metaphors.
The appealing part is the depiction of the evil characters as endlessly dependant on the hero characters, and their view of them as an inexhaustible source of resources for whatever they want, and the rejection of this.
The obsession with trains is probably because in era when Ayn Rand lived, people working with trains were an intellectual elite. They (1) worked with technology, and often (2) travelled across the world and shared ideas with similar people. If you worked at a railroad, sometimes you got free rides anywhere as an employment benefit. It was an era before internet, where the best way to share ideas with bright people was to meet them personally.
In other words, if she lived today, she would probably write about hackers, or technological entrepreneurs. John Galt would be the inventor of internet, or nanotechnology, or artificial intelligence. (And he would use modafinil instead of nicotine.)