William knows his father is dead. Everyone knows it. Everyone except William's sister, who hears him calling to her. Despite William's warnings, she disappears in the night to find their father. To rescue his sister, William must travel through dangerous forests swarming with bandits. But human foes are the least of his problems. His quest will take him beyond the world he knows and into far-off lands - where monsters are real, the dead can speak, and lies become truths.

Birds wasting away in a national park, refusing to migrate. Identical geometric markings on the wings of completely different insect species. A pillar of dust in the desert. A small-time hood travels to India's shipbreaking yards in search of a giant nuclear-powered construction robot. A big-time crime boss makes a killing off the Algerian Revolution, in a world where it happened fifteen years later than in our own. "A good story," insists reporter Françoise Halfort, visited abruptly by a post-menopausal pregnancy, "is one that draws unexpected connections between seemingly unconnected events." Four star creators join talents on a vast canvas that takes in the entire French 20th century.