Something is wrong with Eddie Hobson Sr., father of four, sometime history teacher, quiz master, black humourist and virtuoso invalid. His recurring fainting spells have worsened, and with his ingrained aversion to doctors, his worried family tries to discover the nature of his sickness. Meanwhile, in private, Eddie puts the finishing touches on a secret project he calls 'Hobbstown', a place that he promises will save him, the world and everything that's in it.

'Richard Powers is the most intellectually stimulating novelist at work in the English language today... Sentence after sentence has the razor-sharp quality of aphorism about the weird wired world we have made' Daily Telegraph