Venturing into a universe different from where his previous novels--Lightpaths, Standing Wave, and Better Angels--were set, Howard V. Hendrix tackles one of life's most enduring questions: What does it mean to be human? In a dramatically altered near-future, the world's newest technology resurrects a plague of apparent global madness that not only destroys ten thousand years of urban civilization, but also creates a world under the sway of the full moon--and a human race transformed in astonishing ways.