The simplest explanation is usually the most likely—but in the world of Absence, nothing is simple. A moving, richly detailed sci-fi detective procedural for fans of The Leftovers and The City & the City.

The human population is vanishing, one by one, into thin air: a global cataclysm known as Spontaneous Human Absence. In a world where prospects for survival are increasingly grim—where, at any moment, you or a loved one might “pop” without warning—uncertainty and hopelessness reign.

To manage the crisis, the US government has established the Bureau of Depopulation Affairs—an ad hoc federal agency for which Agent Harvey Ellis works the night shift. Harvey’s job: to investigate claims of Absence and, if validated, give the remainders a small benefit check for their loss. It’s thankless bureaucratic work, but Harvey is content in his routine.

That is, until a woman long thought Absent reappears in her hometown of Dawnville, Kansas, offering an enticing answer to the world’s most profound mystery: She knows where the Absent go, because she herself has been there. Is her story true, or is she the latest in a line of false prophets, offering empty hope to a desperate world? Together with his quick-witted, no-BS partner, Shonda Erins, Harvey travels to Dawnville—where they assume the role of detective and are quickly drawn into the allure of a new perspective.