Tearing across Southern Africa is a mysterious virus creating universal infertility. They call it the Silence.​

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Growing fear is stirring African memories of plunderers from the past and suspicions about who might be behind this.​

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Leading African doctors have scaled up an unprecedented effort to stop this amazingly adaptable virus.​

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To press the pace, they recruit a team of reproductive gene therapists. They begin unraveling the virus’s secrets while fleeing from city to city ahead of a charismatic populist trying to terrorize these outsiders into leaving.​

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As his brilliant mother leads the doctors, young Elias and his attentive father hide from growing threats in rural Kenya. Exploring wildlife reserves and Cradle of Mankind sites, they quietly help each other make sense of the profound changes unfolding.​

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Can the best minds in genetics stay ahead of the mounting danger and outsmart the virus? The future of humanity hangs in the balance.