Kate Quinlan wants some answers. Shes a young British expat working in Silicon Valley, with a pet bonobo chimp, and a hole left in her life by the death of her brother. When she meets behavioural geneticist Helen Dolan, solutions to the mysteries of human nature suddenly seem closer at hand. But what they ultimately discover shocks them to the core: if true, it might just explain the entire human condition. Soon, Kate and her friends are on the run, pursued by a variety of religious zealotsall determined to obtain the key to the stretch of human DNA known as the Pandora Sequence.