From the author of JPOD and GENERATION X comes a dazzling new work that reimagines the very act of reading and storytelling in a crazed digital world. In the near future bees are extinct - until five unconnected individuals are stung. Immediately snatched up by ominous figures in hazmat suits, they are interrogated separately in neutral Ikea-like chambers, and then released as 15-minute-celebrities into a world driven almost entirely by the internet. A charismatic scientist with dubious motives eventually brings the quintet together, and their shared experience unites them in a way they could never have imagined.

DOUGLAS COUPLAND was born on a NATO base in Germany in 1961. He is the author of the international bestseller JPOD and ten other novels including THE GUM THIEF, HEY NOSTRADAMUS!, ALL FAMILIES ARE PSYCHOTIC AND GENERATION X. His books have been translated into thirty-five languages and published in most countries around the world. He is also a visual artist and sculptor, furniture designer and screenwriter. He lives and works in Vancouver.