The new novel by Scarlett Thomas, an English writer who has gained fame as one of the best and most original novelists of our time, is a paradoxical family saga, witty, fascinating, with many facets of meaning. This is a novel about the secrets of botany and the mysterious connection between plants and people, about sex, about the labyrinths of human consciousness, about magic books, about finding eternal freedom at the cost of death. The fateful seed pods inherited by the heroes promise enlightenment. But which of them will dare to step beyond life and death?