Back cover copy:
The first radio message from space arrives, in code, and the task of deciphering its possibly apocalyptic meaning falls to fourteen-year-old Billy Twillig--denizen of the Bronx and a Nobel Laureate in math. In the course of this ultimate assignment he encounters, among others, Henrik Endor, who failed to break the code and who now lives in a hole ... Orang Mohole, the acknowledged kingpin of alternate physics ... Shazar Lazarus Ratner, a renowned astronomer turned mystic ... Elux Troxl, a "semi-treacherous entrepreneur" who deals in leased computer time, chain letters and bat guano. And after twelve days in this gently demented landscape, Billy has come face-to-face with a central paradox of our time: the chimeras of the scientific mind.
